When Sister Margherita Marchione died recently, at the age of 99, the New York Times, to its credit, published a lengthy and sympathetic obituary. Less to its credit was the clumsy anti-Catholic mistake in the obituary. A mistake the newspaper then, surprisingly, corrected.
Best known for her works defending Pope Pius XII, Sr Margherita was also a gifted teacher, lecturer, literary scholar and dedicated member of her order, the Religious Teachers Filippini, which she’d entered in 1935. Her autobiography, The Fighting Nun, is a wonderful read. The American nun wrote eight books in defense of the pope, after retiring as professor of Italian language and literature at Fairleigh Dickinson University. When she died, her life and achievements were celebrated not only by the Vatican and Catholic media, but major secular outlets as well.
