By Paula Day

A determination to use her talents as long as possible has kept Sister Marie Immaculata Dubee, SND, from being set on a shelf, as she would put it.

The Sister of Notre Dame de Namur is celebrating 60 years as a Religious, the last 19 of which she has spent ministering in St. Thomas More parish in Decatur.

"My activities keep my mind alert," the 80-year-old Religious said. "I'm not going to sit on a shelf. I thank God every day of my life that I can keep using my talents. If I find I can't do one thing, I fall back on another.

This strong-willed determination itself seems to be one of Sister Marie's talents. When she decided to enter Religious life, she wanted to "launch out on my own," she explained. Although she had relatives who were Religious she selected a congregation where she had "no connections. I didn't want to get mixed up in family matters that could take my mind off what I wanted to do. I wanted to give my whole self to the Lord."

Her search for a religious congregation brought her to the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur and she entered the novitiate at their motherhouse in Waltham, MA, in 1931.

Sister Marie is the third oldest in a family of six. She was born in Head Of Millstream, New Brunswick, the Canadian province which borders the state of Maine on the northeast. New Brunswick is one of Canada's Maritime Provinces, which also include Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, Newfoundland and Labrador.

The Dubees lived on the family farm which supplied food for the table with produce, eggs and grain left over to market. Stored potatoes, beets, carrots and turnips kept vegetables on the table through the winter months. "I never knew store bread 'till I left home," Sister Marie says simply.

Life was wholesome in New Brunswick. During the winter, when farming was at a lull, activities centered around the lumber camps.

"Our great joy," Sister Marie remembers, "was to go into camp on our sleds. The women would cook a feast, and we'd spend the evening enjoying the meal and listening to the music. Some of the men had violins and accordions." In summer the young people enjoyed rafting and swimming near the dam.

"My parents were very religious," she recalls. "Dad was strict with us, but we had our fun." She attributes her vocation to her mother. While her father did not want her to become a Religious, he would not have forbidden it. Her mother, on the other hand, kept "dropping hints" encouraging her daughter's vocation.

It was not unusual for young people in New Brunswick to gravitate south to Boston and other urban areas. Sister Marie had cousins and other relatives in Massachusetts when she went to Boston to work. After she decided to become a Sister of Notre Dame she sent her parents two letters. In the first she announced: "I'm going to get married. I'm engaged to a very wealthy man. He has many houses, one of them here near Boston." She heard later that her mother read the letter in silence, passed it to her father and went upstairs. The second letter explained her intention to become a sister.

Sister Marie recalls her father telling her, "You're like the groundhog. You're going to go in and stay." She entered the congregation on February 2, several weeks shy of her 18th birthday.

"After 60 years I have no regrets," Sister Marie Immaculata says. "If I had it to do over, I'd do the same. I'm satisfied with my life. God has given me talents and I have put them to use. I thank God I can, and I'll continue as long as God gives me my talents to do His work."

Sister Marie's conversation is sprinkled with the phrase, "thank God." One of her first assignments was managing the dining room at Trinity College in Washington, D.C. The young sister was not only responsible for procuring supplies, but for hiring and firing employees, many of whom were older than she.

"I just said, 'Dear God, I cannot do it without you.' He helped me with all that responsibility. He worked through me. Thank God."

In her early 60s she came to Georgia, "sent here so I wouldn't have so much to do." But determined to keep active, she has put her hand to everything from sewing, to upholstery, to sacristy work and helping in the school office. As a Eucharistic minister she visits nursing homes and the homebound in St. Thomas More and since Father Hugh Bryan left to become parochial vicar and St. John Neumann in Lilburn, she has been spiritual director for the Legion of Mary in the parish. "When I retire completely," she explains, "I'll go to Villa Julie, our retirement home outside Baltimore."

The home will be the site of a special jubilee celebration this summer when she joins others celebrating anniversaries as Religious. Of the 27 women who entered with her, 12 are still living.

Recently she returned from a visit with two sisters and a niece in California, a surprise gift marking her jubilee.

The local community of Sisters of Notre Dame is planning a June 1 celebration even though Sister Marie "rebelled" against such attention.

"I'm not the kind to go out for all this excitement," she explained. "I'm a reserved person." She was convinced to go along with the plans by a lay woman who told her, "You owe it to us. You're something in our lives, too. It's a great thing knowing someone who could stay in religious life 60 years."

Blanche Zuber, a St. Thomas More parishioner for 45 years, has known Sister Marie since she arrived in Georgia.

"We're just good friends," Mts. Zuber explained. "She's a very caring person, rather serious and she feels things deeply." The longtime friend praised the Religious' handiwork as a seamstress, adding, "She does beautiful upholstery more as a labor of love than for payment." The two women enjoy flowers and gardening. Recently they planted azaleas in the convent yard.

Louise Jones has known Sister Marie for eight years and accompanies her on visits to the Briarcliff Nursing Home. "She is wonderful with sick people," Mrs. Jones offered, "so gentle and loving. They love her and look forward to her visit."

Father Hugh Byron will celebrate the June 1 Mass at St. Thomas More Church, 624 Ponce de Leon Avenue in Decatur.