Mary Magdalen Greenwell was born April 22, 1908, in Curdsville, Ky., to Matthew Greenwell and Elizabeth Sauer Byrne Greenwell. Elizabeth Sauer had four children —Leo, Michael, Wallace and Anna Marie— from her first marriage to Augusta Byrne. One year after her husband’s death, Elizabeth married Matthew Greenwell. Mary Magdalen was the first of the seven children born to this marriage — Emma, Rose, Homer, Lester, Clement and Julius. Matthew Greenwell had been among the early Kentucky colonists of the San Juan River Valley at Waterflow, N.M. He was disenchanted by the mesas of New Mexico and returned to the “his own Green River hills” and became one of Daviess County’s prosperous and leading citizens on his farm in Curdsville. The family was deeply religious. Mr. Greenwell attended daily Mass and led the family in morning and night prayers. Though his wife was not Catholic, she helped raise the children in that faith. Each of them received the Sacraments of Initiation at St. Elizabeth in Curdsville and attended the parish school, grades 1 through 11. The girls finished high school at Mount Saint Joseph Academy. She, herself, finally became a Catholic.
After graduating from the Academy, Mary Magdalen entered the novitiate at Mount Saint Joseph on January 21,1927. She received the name Sister Mary Clement and was invested in the Ursuline habit on August 17, 1927. She made temporary vows on August 15,1929 and final profession on August 15, 1932.
As a novice, Sister Mary Clement did substitute teaching at New Haven, Stanley, and Chicago, Ky. After profession, her full-time teaching career began at St. Joseph High School in Owensboro for one year. In 1930, she was among the first Ursulines who opened a Catholic school in Glennonville, Mo., teaching grades 1-4 for 10 years. In 1940, she was missioned to Flaherty, Ky., followed by Waterflow N.M., Fredericktown, Holy Cross, St. Charles, New Haven, and Raywick, Ky. She returned to Glennonville in 1959 for four years, then to Peonia, Ky., Affton, Mo., Farmington, N.M.,, Blessed Mother and Immaculate, Owensboro, and finally, ended her classroom teaching at St. Margaret Mary in Louisville in 1978. Sister’s higher educational history includes Mount Saint Joseph Junior College, St. Louis University, Catholic Teachers College (Albuquerque, N.M.), Brescia, and Western Kentucky University. In addition, Sister became certified in multiple training programs — ministry to the sick and aged, tutoring, literacy and adult learning, English as a second language, and ministry to cancer victims.
After retiring from teaching in 1978, she entered a very rich and rewarding stage of life, living with other retired MSJ Ursulines at St. Boniface, an old inner-city parish in Louisville where she did outreach ministry for 11 years. These ministries included University Hospital, the Red Cross, the Cancer Center, Nursing Homes, Red Cross Blood Donor Center, teaching English to refugees, Bible classes for African-Americans, St. Boniface Soup Kitchen and other nutrition centers. She was active (demonstrating and writing letters) in the anti-abortion movement, and volunteered at City Hall as needed. She received multiple awards for outstanding service during these 11 years.
Sister retired to the Motherhouse in 1989. Despite poor health, she remained active within community life. She celebrated her 101st birthday with family and friends on April 22, 2009, her 82nd year as an Ursuline, still very aware of what was happening around her. Sister Mary Clement died on September 23, 2009, in Saint Joseph Villa. Funeral services were held Friday, September 25, in Mount Saint Joseph Chapel. Rev. Dave Glockner celebrated the Mass of Resurrection at 10:30 a.m. The Ursulines, nieces, nephews and many friends attended the service and accompanied Sister Mary Clement’s remains to the convent cemetery for burial.