Timeless Ties

SUMMERTIME LUNCH OUTING RECONNECTS SISTER WITH
COLLEGE STUDENTS SHE MENTORED 50 YEARS AGO

Sister Pat Marie Buranosky tends to look years younger than the 91 candles atop her most recent birthday cake would suggest. But on one particular afternoon this summer, she was absolutely glowing, as anyone might be after taking a ride in a time machine, transported 50 years into the past.

She’d just returned home to Mt. Assisi Place in Pittsburgh, Pa., after she and three friends she hadn’t seen since the 1970s filled a nearby eatery with joyous laughter and colorful tales from their time together at Indiana University of Pennsylvania (IUP).

Back then, Sister Pat Marie was still known by her religious name, Sister Mark (she returned to her baptismal name in the 1980s). Along with the late Sister Susanne Cherney, she was serving in the Newman Center campus ministry program at IUP, where she encountered students Sue Pesch, Linda Benigni, Debbie Saldutte and Gina Nania in 1973.

Sister likely did not realize then the impact that her spiritual guidance had on the Catholic co-eds as they adjusted to college life. But on this day … over lunch … they told her.

“She was the guiding light who helped me through the transition from a small-town life to campus life,” Linda recalls. “She was the role model of faith that I needed to guide me through my college years.”

Now retired from Brookville Area School District, Linda still communicates regularly with her college classmates, including Debbie, who set the whole thing in motion, albeit by bittersweet means.

When Sister Pat’s brother, Bernie Buranosky, died last May, Debbie saw his obituary. The distinctive family name and the mention of a surviving sibling named “Sister Pat” immediately rang a bell. Because she knew her former mentor only as Sister Mark, Debbie decided to roll the dice, so to speak, and connect a few dots. She passed a note to Sister through a neighbor who works at the attending funeral home, and the rest is history.

“A few days later, I had a voicemail from Sister Pat and knew immediately she was the friend we called Sister Mark,” Debbie says.

She reached out to Sue and Linda and, soon, an impromptu reunion was on the calendar. In June, they fetched her from Mt. Assisi Place and took her on an uplifting afternoon trip down Memory Lane. They also looped in Gina by phone from her home in South Dakota.

“From the moment we all got situated in the car for the ride to lunch, it was as if we hadn’t missed a beat,” Debbie says. “Sister is as spunky as ever, and her spiritual reflections are as meaningful to me now as they were 50 years ago.”

Debbie’s volunteer work with Goodwill of Southwestern Pennsylvania and with an ESL class for immigrants at her church is living proof that Sister’s lessons about social justice issues still resonate. Sue, too, followed in Sister’s footsteps by teaching in Catholic schools. She eventually transitioned into the insurance industry and, in retirement, volunteers with South Hills Interfaith Movement.

“Because of Sister Mark, I felt so at home at the Newman Center during my college years,” Sue says. “I remember her popping into our dorm rooms and just talking and laughing, encouraging us to be involved in our faith and social justice issues.”

The “girls” aren’t girls anymore. They are wives and grandmothers who, after building lives of their own, now appreciate more than even the blessings of their younger years.

“I felt that same comradery at lunch that I felt 50 years ago in our college days,” Sue says.

After recapturing that same old undeniable magic, the group has exchanged emails and plans to keep in touch. They shouldn’t expect any arguments from Sister Pat.

“I’m so thankful that our paths have again come together,” Debbie says. “What a beautiful day we had. I’m still smiling about our time together.”