Sr. Peggy's kindness and humility were second to none

There are farewells that you know are coming but when they arrive, numerous emotions cross your mind.

That feeling would describe my thoughts, and most likely those of several more people, on the retirement of Sr. Margaret Cruise, who is affectionately known as “Sr. Peggy,” from St. Apollinaris Catholic Church in Napa, CA. Sr. Peggy has called St. A’s her home for 35 years. While St. A’s was already a good place when she arrived, Sr. Peggy made it even better.

For yours truly, St. A’s is a return trip. I graduated from there in 1987 and have been fortunate enough to return as a parent. My oldest, Juliette, will be a fifth grader this fall while twins, Thomas and Danielle will enter third grade. It blows their mind that clergy members were actually once teachers but I digress.

Sr. Peggy’s retirement has been common knowledge for quite some time but on Saturday she will board a plane to return to her native country of Ireland. The preceding weeks have been filled with goodbyes, luncheons and tributes.

The biggest thing I keep processing about Sr. Peggy’s time at St. A’s is this: “I was not only blessed to be part of the first class she taught at St. A’s, I was even more blessed that she stayed there long enough to meet my children.” All three of our kids made First Communion in her presence and for that, i am even more awed. For that matter, I could say the same thing for long-time St. A’s teacher Virginia Reilly, who will always be Miss Reilly to me.

Sr. Peggy retired in 2015 as director of Religious Education in 2015 but the term “retired” was a loose definition in her case. Her footprints remained on every square inch of St. A’s in whichever role she was needed and she filled it selflessly. Sr. Peggy taught for four years before moving to the aforementioned role as director of Religious Education.  

We have teachers and coaches in our lives that we deem influential. For me, the teachers have always been the likes of Dan Clark and Bob Morrish at Justin-Siena along with Mary Clark at St. A’s. On the coaches side, I frequently point to the likes of Frank Defilippis along with my youth baseball coaches Wayne Plath and Ray Sisemore.

Though I remember her most as a teacher, I don’t think I could lump Sr. Peggy solely into that role. She did much more than teach you the Our Father and Hail Mary. She taught you how to establish a relationship with the Lord. When teaching English, it was not limited to nouns, verbs and pronouns. I remember her teaching us that every sentence had a purpose, including a diagram that broke down every sentence by subject, verb, and object. That skill came in handy when I was a sports reporter for 18 years.  

Every teacher has their own style. Some are the disciplinarian types. Others exude tenderness and kindness. Sr. Peggy was the latter as her soft spoken Irish brogue carried a tender and caring heart. That description, however, can be misleading. You’ve heard the phrase, “don’t mistake my kindness for weakness.” That would be Sr. Peggy. She carried a certain reverence and humility. If you misbehaved, she didn’t have to say anything. You knew you were in the wrong. The unspoken message was “you know better,” and you felt bad letting her down because she taught you better.

I frequently find myself rewinding the clock to 1982, when Sr. Peggy arrived at St. A’s known as Sr. Gabrielle. The school had an established base on nuns that included Sr. Philomena, Sr. Olive Murphy and Sr. Mary Corcoran. That situation is never easy for a newcomer but Sr. Peggy transition into the St. A’s family seamlessly.

For many years, I was out of contact with St. A’s between living out of state in college, receiving my Bachelor of Arts degree in journalism from the University of Nebraska. When moving back to California, Napa specifically, in 1998, the contact remained minimal for another nine years. I married my wonderful wife, Jacqueline, in 2003.

When Juliette was born in 2007, we decided that we wanted to send her and any ensuing children to St. A’s. Slowly but surely, we re-established roots in the St. A’s circle. Whether it was a Sunday mass, the 50th anniversary dinner in 2009, the annual crab feed, or First Holy Communion parents meetings, Sr. Peggy was the go-to person to re-acquaint.

St. A’s has had many identifiable faces throughout the years from Fr. Michael Cleary to Mary Clark to Barbara Collins and the aforementioned Miss Reilly to name a few.

However, I say without any further equivocation, there’s only one Sr. Peggy.