Marian Alice Rose Powers was born on February 6, 1933, to Everett and Eva Mae Elder Powers of Cloverport, Kentucky. She was one of 10 children in the Powers family. They were a family of five boys and five girls. Verrill, Kenneth, Raphael, Father Benjamin, Sister Marian, Randolph, Sister Ann Roberta, Eulaine, Sister Rose Jean and Gussie.
She was baptized at St. Rose Church in Cloverport on April l, 1933, and confirmed at St. Rose Church on October 9, 1941 by Bishop Francis R. Cotton. Marian’s mother, Eva Mae, was a homemaker for her children, and her father Everett was a carpenter. For many years, he traveled from the family home in Cloverport to Fort Knox to work on construction of the Army base. The children didn’t get to see their father much in those days. When he was home, Sister Marian said she would sit in his lap and he would help her with her homework.
The boys in her family attended the public high school in Cloverport, but Marian’s parents wanted the girls to attend private school. Ann Roberta went to St. Vincent’s Academy in Waverly, Kentucky, which was run by the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth, but Marian got a scholarship to attend Mount Saint Joseph Academy, as did Rose Jean and Gussie.
Four of the Powers children followed a religious vocation. Marian’s oldest sister, Ann Roberta, entered the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth and served most of her life in India. Marian and Rose Jean entered the Ursuline Sisters of Mount Saint Joseph and her brother became a priest in the Diocese of Owensboro.
During her junior year, Marian decided she wanted to join the Ursulines. She entered in the fall of 1951, a few months after graduating from the Academy. She said, “I never looked back, I knew this is what I wanted.”
She entered the novitiate on August 14, 1952, and was given the name Sister Rose Marian Powers. Later it was changed to Sister Marian Powers. She made Temporary Profession on August 15, 1954, and Perpetual Profession on August 15, 1957.
Sister Marian received her bachelor’s degree in History from Brescia University in 1964 and her Master’s Degree from Xavier University in 1979. She also received a Professional Certificate for School Administration and Supervision, an Endorsement for Elementary School Principal for grades 1-8 and a Standard Elementary Teaching Certificate for Grades 1-8.
Sister Marian’s teaching career took her to many different schools, all in Kentucky. Her first teaching position was at St. Martin School, Rome, followed by St. Francis Xavier School in Raywick. She then held positions of teacher, principal, or both at St. Raphael School not far from the Mount, St. Edward School in Jeffersontown, Flaherty, Vine Grove, Leitchfield, Louisville, Mayfield, and Sorgho.
In 1987, Father Pete Hughes asked her to be a pastoral minister in McQuady and at her home parish of St. Rose of Lima in Cloverport. She loved working with the adults, discussing religion and seeing the adults get excited about Jesus and the Church. Other ministries that followed included pastoral minister at St. Anthony Parish in Axtel, local coordinator for the Motherhouse at Mount Saint Joseph, a return to minister at St. Rose of Lima Parish in Cloverport and Holy Guardian Angel Parish in Irvington. In 2005, she returned to the Mount and began her ministry at the post office.
Sister Marian, 84, died Monday, November 27, 2017, at Mount St. Joseph in her 65th year of religious life. The funeral Mass was at 10:30 a.m. on Thursday, November 30, 2017 in the Motherhouse Chapel with burial in the convent cemetery.