Sisters of Mission San Jose Dominican Celebrates 105 Years

Some information from Alexandra Oros of On Lok

Sister Hosanna Almaguer recently celebrated her 105th birthday and enjoyed every minute of the festivities. She has been a Dominican for 82 years!

Sister, graced with a winning smile, was born in a small village in Mexico and was one of 8 children in a loving family. Mexico, at the time Sister was growing up, was a place of poverty and war; a hard time to be raising many children. Her family survived, however, by working closely together and helping one another.

Although Church was far away from her family home, Maria, as she was called, loved going to Mass and singing in the choir. She had a natural love of prayer and thought about becoming a Sister even though her greatest joy was playing with her brothers and sisters.

However, she did decide to become a Sister, just like her older cousin. Maria entered the Dominican Sisters of Mission San Jose in Mexico in 1925, when she was 22 years old. In 1926 because of persecution in Mexico, Sister moved to the United States, where she has spent the last 82 years!

Although her main ministry over the years was cooking, she considered care of the home and all in it part of her responsibilities. Anyone who lived with Sister would say that she cared for each Sister and did all she could to help each person in any way possible.

Currently, Sister is residing in the Dominican Sisters Care Center at Mission San Jose, and she spends her time praying for peace and justice in the world, for all the Sisters in ministry, and for all our friends and benefactors. She gets up at 4 a.m. every day in order to accomplish this task!

“I can never thank God enough for taking such good care of me over the years,” Sister Hosanna said recently. “My life is an alleluia to God!” Anyone who knows Sister realizes that she truly is an alleluia!