Rose Marie was born to Joseph Edward and Jane Isabel Perdue Willett, their second child, on November 5, 1918, at Waverly, Ky. Her older brother, Edward, and six other siblings: Dorothy Jane, Anna Ursula, Mary Kathleen, Joseph Vernon, Theresa Bernadette and Doris Hiltrude made up the happy family of Joseph and Jane Willett.
Rose Marie began grade school at St. Ann, Morganfield, Ky., taught by the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth. The family moved to Corydon, Ky., where she finished elementary and junior high school in public schools. She came to Mount Saint Joseph Academy for high school. After graduation, she entered the novitiate on September 8, 1937. She received the habit and the name Sister Rosita on August 14, 1938. The family moved to Wabash County, Ill., that same year.
After first profession of vows in August 1940, Sister Rosita began her teaching ministry at St. Denis School in Shively, Ky., followed by years of varied ministries. She taught at St. William High School, Knottsville, Ky.; St. Thomas in Farmington, N.M.; Holy Cross, Marion County, Ky.; St. Joseph and Paul, and Brescia College in Owensboro; St. Thomas More, Paducah, Ky.; St. Joseph, San Fidel, N.M.; St. Peter, Stanley, Ky. (tutor for the Vietnamese children); Immaculate Conception, Earlington, Ky.; St. Martin, Rome, Ky.; and, St. Edward, Jeffersontown, Ky. She served as supervisor of elementary schools in the Diocese of Owensboro; as coordinator of religious education at St. Ignatius, Louisville; pastoral assistant and language arts teacher at St. Mary Parish, Mount Carmel, Ill. She ended her full life of active ministry as clerical assistant for the Ministry Formation Program at Brescia University, tutor for student support services there and a volunteer at the Daniel Pitino homeless shelter.
Ill health forced Sister Rosita to retire to the Motherhouse in 1996. She is remembered as bouncing through life with a charming smile, full of energy, a hard worker and lover of people, possessing an unusual love of teaching and sharing her faith. After almost a decade of intense suffering from loss of both physical and cognitive strength, she died in Saint Joseph Villa on Ash Wednesday, February 21, 2007. Father Kenneth Schaefer, pastor of St. Mary Parish in Mount Carmel, Ill., celebrated the funeral Mass in the Motherhouse Chapel, February 24, along with Father Dave Glockner GMHM and Father Tom Kirkendoll, GMHM. Sister’s remains are buried in the convent cemetery. Her Ursuline sister, Sister Dorothy Marie Willett, survived her.