Gift of being with the dying
Obituaries
Sr Bernadine Breen LCM - Born May 16 1929; Died April 28 2025
Bernadine was born in Brisbane and joined the Little Company of Mary on February 2 1956. She was professed on October 11 1958 and made her perpetual vows on July 1 1962.
Her ‘motto’ taken at that time was ‘Behold thy mother’.
Bernadine spent several years in the Archdiocese of Adelaide at Calvary North Adelaide. She was appointed to Calvary in the mid-1970s.
Mary-Lynne Haymes, who trained as a nurse at Calvary North Adelaide from 1974 to 1977, has lovely memories of Bernardine as she was particularly kind and helpful to the young women while they were training.
She remembered that Mary Potter Hospice in Barnard Street North Adelaide was the forerunner of the present Mary Potter Hospice built adjacent to Calvary Hospital North Adelaide in the mid-1980s.
Sr Bernadine was appointed as nurse in charge of the new hospice and her ministry focused entirely on palliative and end-of-life care.
Bernadine spent several years at the hospice and was very much appreciated. She had a wonderful gift of being with the dying, supporting relatives as they visited their loved ones. Bernardine was well-regarded by the ‘medicos’ and on many a night she would sit with a dying patient throughout their last hours.
In the late 1980s, before she left South Australia, Bernardine spent some time at the Wallaroo’s Star of the Sea Nursing Home in the Diocese of Port Pirie.
Bernardine retired to Sydney and spent her final years at Calvary Retirement Community Ryde.
At the time of her death in April 2025 Bernardine Sr Bernadine Breen LCM. Her foundress Venerable Mary Potter’s last words: ‘Thank God always for the happiness and beauty of life – it is beautiful’ would surely find an echo in the life of Bernardine.
She certainly would have heard those words; from our loving God: ‘Well done, good and faithful servant’.
– Sr Anne Sheridan LCM
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