Sister of Mercy Mary Lisa Staudacher worked wherever needed

Sister of Mercy Mary Lisa Staudacher once wrote that she could be considered a generalist.

“My experiences have been extremely varied,” she said. “I did social work when needed. I have been a substitute teacher on the college level and taught first through eighth grades.”

During her 66 years of religious life, Sister Lisa also served as a bookkeeper, secretary, pastoral minister and volunteer.

The Omaha native died May 27 at Mercy Villa in Omaha. She was 94.

Funeral services were June 2 at Mercy Villa, followed by burial at Resurrection Cemetery in Omaha.

Sister Lisa “went wherever the community needed her most,” the Sisters of Mercy said in a written tribute.

In Omaha, Sister Lisa worked as an assistant secretary at the Sisters of Mercy Provincial House from 1962 to 1963, in various duties at the former Maryview Convent from 1968 to 1969, as office and accounting help at the former St. Catherine’s Hospital from 1969 to 1977, and in accounting at the former Mercy Care Center from 1977 to 1978.

Sister Lisa also served as a secretary at the former St. Joseph Center for Mental Health from 1978 to 1992, as a volunteer at Bergan Mercy Medical Center and the College of Saint Mary from 1993 to 1995, as a secretary for the archdiocese’s Hispanic ministry in 1996, as a volunteer secretary for Mercy Housing Midwest from 1996 to 2001 and as a volunteer at College of Saint Mary from 2001 to 2007.

She graduated from the former St. Joseph High School in 1944 and worked for a time at Union Pacific Railroad’s headquarters in Omaha.

In 1955, at age 28, she entered the Sisters of Mercy. She professed temporary vows in 1957 and perpetual vows in 1960.

Sister Lisa earned a bachelor’s degree in English from the College of Saint Mary in 1959 and a certificate in pastoral ministry from Creighton University in 1991.