Thais Hilda Scully
July 24, 1916 - February 8, 2002
She was eighty-five and still young, so that her passing came as a shock. Her last meal was a community seafood supper, and she ate heartily as she did everything. Indeed, she was whole of heart, intense in study, in community prayer, in work, and in play.
As a novice of seventeen she wrote (and illustrated!) "Life is just a football game." Players might be tackled by her list of vices, but "What's the difference? ... If I can carry my ball over the line of scrimmage (trials and tasks), I am progressing onward to the goal line (Heaven) for a touchdown... It is sensational when a team with a fighting spirit comes from behind to win."
No one will deny her fighting spirit. Born second of four into an Irish-American (with a trace of French) family with two brothers and a younger sister, she described herself as "a little tomboy." As a senior at Dominican High, Thais wrote in November, 1932, to Mother Catherine, "Ever since I was a little girl I have had a desire to enter religion. Now ... I ask..." The rest is history. Her cousin and classmate, Shirley Scully said, "She didn't tell us anything beforehand. She just appeared Dec. 8 in the black outfit of a postulant. "Ever determined, she had overcome the misgivings of her parents.
Almost seventy years later we look back on an illustrious record of service. Perhaps her small size and unflagging energy first marked her for the challenge of primary teaching; soon enough she was spotted as a promising administrator and religious superior. After a month of substituting in the dual role (she was 27), and having earned her BA in Saturday and summer classes she was rarely to have a rest from it. As principal of Dominican High School, she ran a tight ship; the order was so complete that joy and freedom prevailed. When she was appointed to the then new role of "Juniorate Mistress" just before the turbulent post-Vatican sixties she threw herself into understanding the young sisters in formation, and championing them to her peers in administration.
The sisters received condolence cards from many of them; those who could came to her funeral. There came also an elderly man who was her second-grade pupil at Our Lady of Lourdes in 1934, and a Baton Rouge doctor who remembered her not just as principal at St. Agnes, but as his football coach.
She was truly a woman of passion ("opinionated" might be an understatement.), yet nearly always willing to listen to the other side of a question. She rarely missed the Judaeo-Christian Lecture Series at Tulane, and never failed to take notes and fill in the substance for her sisters who were unable to attend. She was indeed a lifelong learner.
She was enthralled with the magic of computers, and attended a Microsoft workshop for educators with Sr. M. Michaeline, where she heard Bill Gates (She didn't tell him she and Sister Mary Magdalen had made the match between Melinda's parents, right here at Dominican High School.) She was elated that she got a voucher for a free copy of Windows, but alas, she had no computer. She actually took one or two lessons on the little hand-me-down computer at the motherhouse, and thought it would be useful for cataloguing her opera collection, but she ran out of time.
Opera was one of her passions; her brother Ray, a serious opera buff, supplied her with material. One of her "young sisters" recalled that Sister set aside a quiet place in Siena Hall where the student sisters could listen to opera and classical music.
Her strengths, like determination, could also be the chink in her armor. Sr. M. Veronica recalled that one of her nicknames was "the little general." She was small of stature, but so great of heart. Her profession ring was engraved "My God, my all." She meant it. She lived it. She held nothing back. Her great heart stopped, and she lingered a bit, then peacefully slipped away from us. She was buried on her nameday, the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes, the birthday of her only sister, Lura Lourdes Scully Lopinto. In her own words from age 17, we hear the echo, "Hurrah! We're off for a touchdown!"
