Sister Mary William entered the IHM congregation in 1964, making her final profession in 1972. She served as a teacher at St. Agnes School in Catonsville from 1969 to 1970.

2021 saw the passing of some of the nation’s most important leaders, thinkers, writers and freedom fighters of the modern era.

Father Brian Rafferty, the founding pastor of Church of the Resurrection in Ellicott City who later shepherded Our Lady of the Chesapeake in Lake Shore for 25 years, died on Christmas Eve after an extended illness. He was 84.

Anglican Archbishop Desmond Tutu’s compassion and sense of humor, as well as his commitment to justice and processes of peace, were among the many reasons he was an icon, said Bishop Kevin Dowling of Rustenburg.

Thomas J. Quigley, who worked for 45 years in service to the U.S. bishops, mostly in the realm of foreign policy, died Dec. 11 at age 91.

A funeral Mass was offered Nov. 23 at St. Peter Claver in West Baltimore for Dr. Beverly A. Carroll, a social justice advocate who spent her life raising her voice for African American Catholics in the Archdiocese of Baltimore, the United States and the world.

A funeral Mass for Redemptorist Father Ronald E. Bonneau was offered Nov. 18 at St. John Neumann in Annapolis.

Sister Elizabeth Frances Scully, who ministered in education in the Archdiocese of Baltimore, died Nov. 14. She was 97

A funeral Mass for Redemptorist Father Carl W. Hoegerl will be offered Nov. 11 at 10:30 a.m. at Sacred Heart of Jesus-Sagrado Corazon de Jesus in Highlandtown. Father Hoegerl died Nov. 4. He was 98.

Father Doyle was inspired to become a Josephite while he was a student at Immaculate Conception School in Towson, where he read articles in The Josephite Harvest about the Baltimore-based religious society’s ministry in the African-American community.