Sister Mary (Rochelle) Grosdidier,OSB  

Sister Mary (Rochelle) Grosdidier, OSB, 92, a Benedictine sister of Mount St. Scholastica, Atchison, Kans., died Sunday, July 5, 2026, at the monastery. The vigil service will be Tuesday, July 7, at 7:00 p.m. in the monastery chapel, and the Mass of Resurrection will be celebrated there Wednesday, July 8, at 10:30 a.m.

Sister Mary Grosdidier (formerly Sister Rochelle) was born on Dec. 4, 1933, the sixth of nine children born to Louis and Alice Vitt Grosdidier of St. Paul, Kan. She earned a bachelor’s degree in history from Webster College in St. Louis, Mo., before entering the Mount community in 1957. She received a master’s degree in history from the University of Detroit in 1968 and later earned an administration certificate from Creighton University. She taught for over 30 years in elementary and high schools in Missouri, Nebraska, Kansas, Iowa, and Colorado, and was also school principal for many of those years. She had a sense of adventure and loved traveling to new places and to visit family and friends.  She traveled to Europe and Japan as well as many cities in the United States from Maine to California. After returning to the monastery, she served as office manager of Dooley Center and receptionist. When walking became difficult, she used an electric scooter to attend prayers and activities, as well as to help outdoors with groundskeeping tasks.  

Sister Mary was preceded in death by her parents; by her brothers, Albert, Ralph, Edward and Lawrence Grosdidier; and her sister Theresa Fitzgerald. She is survived by her brother Francis Grosdidier and sisters Alice Nicholson and Jean Scott, nieces, nephews, and her monastic family. Becker-Dyer-Stanton Funeral Home is in charge of arrangements. Memorials may be sent to Mount St. Scholastica or made online at the Mount’s website.

Reflection for the Vigil of Mary Grosdidier, OSB

by Sister Delores Dolezal

“Mary, why do you have that picture hanging so high up on the wall?”  “So I can see it from here lying on my bed.”            

That is what I heard Mary say to me as she lay peacefully on her bed. Perhaps it reminded her of the reading we heard from Proverbs: “It will be a healing for your flesh and a refreshment for your body.”

The picture shows a wide brim hat to wear outside in the sun, well used grubby shoes, a shovel, a walking stick, and a jacket to keep mosquitoes away. All of these are sitting on our Bake House bench. I wondered, is this picture a healing for Mary’s flesh that labored for years in classrooms and outdoors in God’s vineyard? “Mary, is this a picture that reminds you of your ‘completion’? That you have run the race?”

On Sunday morning Mary died. At Mass, the Prophet Zechariah proclaimed, “See your King comes to you.” Paul announces, “The Spirit who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you; the one who raised Christ from the dead will give life to your mortal body also, through his Spirit that dwells in you.” And Jesus filled with Love exclaimed,

“Come to me, you who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest.” 

Tonight the Gospel of the Beatitudes spelled out for us the labor and burdens and good deeds Mary chose to live by. She listened to the words of Benedict and Scholastica, “Prefer nothing whatever to Christ.” 

Mary, you put on the armor of God. You ran the race. Rejoice and leap for joy! Your reward is great in heaven!