Sister Mildred Lotzer, SDS
"My ministries have centered on trying to help others"

Sister Mildred Lotzer, SDS, will celebrate her 25th Jubilee of religious profession on Saturday, June 23, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. She a member of the North American Province of the Sisters of the Divine Savior, an international Congregation. The Sisters’ Community House is located in Milwaukee. Called by Name is the theme of this year’s Salvatorian Jubilee that includes a liturgy, dinner and reception for families and friends.

Sister Mildred was one of the first Sisters to become a woman religious as a second vocation. She had married, raised, her children and was volunteering at a nursing home in Sisseton, South Dakota.

“The Sisters managed the home and became true friends with whom I could be me, the person I longed to be. I saw something in the Sisters that I wanted for myself. But I am still amazed at God’s plan for me to enter the convent as an older person,” she explained.

She points out that since becoming a Salvatorian Sister she has used all the skills she learned as a child on the family farm. “I learned to work wherever I was needed. I also leaned to cook, bake, sew and clean house as well as outdoor chores. I am proud of my parents and to be one of a family of nine children of John and Marie (Sorensen) Nelson. My parents were immigrants from Denmark and made a life and home in South Dakota.”

Friends refer to Sister Mildred as wise, precious, delightful to be with and prayerful.

Today she volunteers in the St. Anne’s laundry, a nursing home facility adjacent to the Sisters’ residence and sponsored by the Congregation. Nearly every day, Sister Mildred is sewing and/or mending for the home’s residents and for the Sisters. She also is part of an ongoing prayer apostolate, reads anything spiritual and has a hunger to keep learning.

“Even as a child, my desire was for peace, to love and be loved and find harmony in the world. This is what I experienced when I first came to know the Sisters. My ministries have centered on trying to help others. I have served as a cook, in the laundry and as a caregiver. There is an inner voice in each of us that speaks to us, teaches us to choose correctly, and to be the best we can,” she said.