Clara Vincent Slatinsky, CSJ
July 12, 1923 - December 25, 2023
"Loyal, energetic and caring."—Sister Laverne Aufmuth
Vincent Slatinsky, formerly of Czechoslovakia, and Clara Janda Slatinsky from Nebraska, parents of three sons, welcomed a daughter, Rita Clara, on November 12, 1928. She was born at home in Sedalia, Missouri, where her father worked for the railroad. Five years later, her parents bought an 80-acre farm, where they grew produce and raised cattle, sheep and chickens.
The children attended St. Patrick’s School, staffed by the Sisters of St. Joseph. Though Rita really wanted to go to St. Teresa’s Academy in Kansas City, her dad said it was too expensive. However, after three years at Sacred Heart High School, she became a boarder at the Academy and used her dad’s railroad pass to go home for the weekend once a month.
Having desired for quite some time that she wanted to be a sister, Rita entered Carondelet on September 15, 1946. She received the habit and her parents’ names, Clara and Vincent, on March 19, 1947. After the novitiate, in 1949, she was sent to live at St. Joseph Hospital in Kansas City (SJH-KC) while studying for her nursing degree at the College of St. Teresa (now Avila University), graduating in 1953.
Sister Clara Vincent's first assignment was as the nurse supervisor in charge at SJH-KC. In 1956, she moved into the position of nurse supervisor at St. Joseph Hospital in Kirkwood, Missouri (SJH-KW). Next, she held the same position at St. Joseph Community Hospital (SJCH) in Hancock, Michigan (1957). From Hancock, she was sent to be a nurse at Nazareth Convent (now Nazareth Living Center) in St. Louis in 1958. In 1960, she returned to a nursing position at SJCH. In 1962, S. Clara ministered again as nurse supervisor at SJH-KW. She assumed the same position at SJH-KC (1963), followed by a brief time as a nurse at Nazareth (1964), before returning once more to SJH-KW that same year.
“She was steadfast,” says Sister Rose McLarney.
“She was there at St. Joseph Hospital through the many changes to the management, services and even ownership.”
In 1967, S. Clara returned to Nazareth until 1969 when she moved to the south to serve as a nurse at St. Joseph Hospital in Augusta, Georgia (SJH-AG). “She always tried to meet the needs of her patients in a loving and kind manner,” says Sister Mary Margaret Lazio. “She was a ‘nurse’s nurse,’ someone you would want to care for you when you were ill.”
Over the years, S. Clara felt blessed to be invited by some of the families that she worked with to go with them on trips to Lourdes, France; Rome, Italy; Medjugorje, Bosnia-Herzegovina; and Fatima, Portugal.
S. Clara retired from nursing in 1996, hoping to fulfill a longtime dream of becoming a chaplain. After starting in a part-time position, she quickly became a full-time chaplain at SJH-AG. In 2008, she became chaplain at Trinity Hospital in Augusta, Georgia. She remained there until retiring to Nazareth Living Center (NLC) in 2014. Two years later, she moved to the Village at Nazareth and then returned to NLC in 2019.
By S. Helen Oates
Watch S. Clara's funeral service