Dominican Sister of Peace Lucille (Lucilla) Winstel, OP, (96) died at Mohun Health Care Center on May 6, 2018. She was born in 1922 in Steubenville, OH, to Florence Gilmore and George Winstel. In 1941 she entered the Dominican Sisters of St. Mary of the Springs, now the Dominican Sisters of Peace. She entered the Kingdom of Heaven on the day she was to have celebrated her 75th Jubilee.
Sister Lucille earned her Bachelor of Science in Education from Saint Mary of the Springs College, now Ohio Dominican University, in 1953. She earned her Master of Arts in Religious Education from Manhattanville College, New York, NY, in 1969. Sr. Lucille loved to teach and to study, and so continued her education to earn a certification in Clinical Pastoral Education from Mount Carmel Hospital. She even studied Spanish to better serve the people of New Mexico and Texas, where she ministered for eight years.
Sister Lucille was a teacher and administrator in New York, Ohio, Texas, and New Mexico for thirty years. Education was her favorite ministry because, as she said, “Teaching enabled me to freely talk about God to others.”
For six years, she was the Administrator of Mohun Hall and worked for a year as Assistant Development Director of Ohio Dominican College. She also served as a nurse’s aide at both the Saint George Hospital in Cincinnati and Mohun Health Care Center.
The organizational skills and attention to detail that made her a great educator also helped her to serve the communication needs of the Columbus Diocese as an editorial assistant at the Catholic Times and to effectively manage the Springs Press, the Congregation’s printing office, for eight years. She continued her ministry as a typist for Sr. Camilla Mullay, the author of A Place of Springs, a congregational history of St. Mary of the Springs.
In later years she served the Congregation and God’s people through her ministry of prayer and presence at the Columbus Motherhouse and at the Mohun Health Care Center.
“She was a person of deep faith, and she lived her life without fear,” said Sister Barbara Kolesar in her preaching at Sr. Lucille’s funeral. “She also loved to laugh, and get the rest to giggle too.”
She was preceded in death by her parents, George and Florence Gilmore Winstel, and her sister, Helen Winstel.
A Vigil of Remembrance and the Mass of Christian Burial were held on May 10 and May 11, respectively, at the Dominican Sisters of Peace Motherhouse Chapel in Columbus, OH. Sr. Lucille is interred at St. Joseph Cemetery in Columbus.
To download a printable version of this memorial, please click here.
Memorial gifts in Sr. Lucille’s memory may be submitted securely online or sent to:
Dominican Sisters of Peace
Office of Mission Advancement
2320 Airport Drive
Columbus, OH 43219.