“He ended up mentoring a lot of people,” Father Proffitt said. “He met people where they were. He was one of those deacons who got people past the idea that ‘we have to have a priest for a wedding or a baptism.’ Even in retirement, he continued to faithfully serve the community.”

Father Philip Snouffer, who pioneered the use of information technology at the Archdiocese of Baltimore’s central office in the late 1980s and early 1990s, died Feb. 18 at Gilchrist Hospice in Towson.

Ursuline Sister Dianna Ortiz was teaching indigenous children as a missionary in Guatemala in 1989 when her ministry was torn apart in the midst of the country’s brutal civil war.

Sister Theresa Fitzgerald, of the Sisters, Servants of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, died Feb. 8 at Our Lady of Peace Residence in Scranton, Pa. She was 88.

Sister Charles Van Hoy of the Sisters of Providence of St. Mary-of-the-Woods died Jan. 27 at Mother Theodore Hall, St. Mary-of-the-Woods, Ind. She was 91.

Deacon Frank Hodges, whose engineering expertise played an integral role in the restoration of Corpus Christi Church in Bolton Hill, died Jan. 11 at age 93.

John Sweeney, who led the AFL-CIO for 14 years from 1995 to 2009, and headed one of the nation’s largest unions, the Service Employees International Union, for 15 years before that, died Feb. 1 at age 86 at his home in the Washington suburb of Bethesda, Maryland

Sister Mary Dee Smith, who entered the Grey Nuns of the Sacred Heart in 1965 and served 30 years in education in the Archdiocese of Baltimores, died Jan. 27 in Philadelphia. She was 81.

Father Rochus Hoat Dinh Vu, a priest who served in his native Vietnam before coming to the Archdiocese of Baltimore, died Jan. 21 in Carthage, Mo. He was 86.

Sister Patricia McAlpin, who was attracted to the Franciscan Sisters of Baltimore by their ministry with African American orphans and served in several ministries in the Archdiocese of Baltimore, died Jan. 14.