"Be true to yourself, and love where you are."
-Sister Mildred Tigges
Sister Mildred Tigges was born at home on a farm in western Iowa, the fourth of six children. She was baptized on the same day, causing her to wonder if she had been sickly at birth. But her father often joked, “We put you in a doll’s crib and had to tip it over to get you out. So I don’t think you were fragile.”
When Sister Mildred was in sixth grade at the local Catholic school staffed by the Franciscan Sisters of Perpetual Adoration, the pastor invited a missionary from China to speak about his work. That talk turned out to be a pivotal moment in Sister Mildred’s life. “It really spoke to me. I just knew I wanted to go to China and be a missionary.”
So she formed a plan, something she is very good at. Since FSPA had sisters in China, she decided to join FSPA. She enrolled as a freshman at the FSPA school in La Crosse for girls interested in religious life, joining twenty-four other girls. Although she was a bit homesick, she made friends and enjoyed the experience.
Her plan was working well. But one day during her sophomore year, she saw all the sisters from China walking down the main corridor of the convent. She learned they had to come home because of the Communist takeover of China. Sister Mildred was inconsolable! “I cried and cried and cried! I thought, ‘Now, I’ll never get to China! What am I going to do?!’”
Eventually, she worked through her pain and sorrow. She finished high school, went through novitiate, and with two years of college was assigned to teach upper grades, and eventually was made principal in schools in Wisconsin and Utah.
Soon Sister Mildred’s latent desire to go to China was tweaked again. An FSPA in Guam became ill and the school needed a junior high teacher. Sister Mildred volunteered and was accepted. “I saw this as an adventure! It wasn’t China, but I loved teaching and I’ve loved every place I’d been so far.” Her first class in Guam was composed of 45 eighth grade boys. After initial qualms, she and the boys got along very well.
But what came next challenged Sister Mildred like never before. When she arrived in Guam, she had facetiously said that she hoped she would experience at least one typhoon while she was on the island. Well, she got her wish!
In the night and early morning of November 11-12, 1962, only a little over eight weeks since Sister Mildred had arrived, Typhoon Karen struck Guam, the most powerful and destructive typhoon ever to hit the island. According to Sister Mildred, “The wind and rain intensified throughout the day. We 13 sisters gathered in our first floor study hall because it was the only room with a cement ceiling and cement walls on two sides. We prayed and prayed. By 11:30 p.m. the roof of the school blew off. Soon after we saw water coming down the stairs, and we then knew that the roof of our convent was gone, too.”
“We dried out the mattresses, put plastic over them, and arranged them on the floor of the study hall, about one foot apart. We ended up sleeping there until June because another typhoon blew through in April and took off the new roof which had just been repaired. I thought I would lose my mind! But ironically, when we first got to move back to our rooms upstairs, we felt lonely. We had grown accustomed to all sleeping together.”
After seven years in Guam as teacher and principal, Sister Mildred came home. She earned various degrees, taught American History and Scripture in high school and served as head of the Department of Education at Viterbo College, now Viterbo University. She loved these various ministries.
Sister Mildred is included in this photo of Blessed Sacrament school staff, taken 1953-54.
She had learned to speak up for herself. “I was always willing to do a different ministry, but I would express my opinion if I thought something else would be better.” So when Sister Mildred realized she would like one more mission experience, she asked about going to Ukraine, but the community suggested she join the FSPA in Zimbabwe. “I went for a three-week trial, and fell in love with the place!” She stayed three years, tutoring and teaching.
But then the terror began. President Mugabe sent youths trained in Communist China out to the rural areas to “re-educate” the white farmers. They terrorized the people, extorting, raping and killing. Sister Mildred was living with one other FSPA, who was gone a lot. She knew it was time to leave when three men in her neighborhood were killed.
Sister Mildred went to St. Rose Convent to volunteer by tutoring college students and second graders, and giving chapel tours. Now that she is officially retired, every day she prays for all the people in the world who don’t have basic needs.
Sister Mildred, left, participated in several recognition luncheons celebrating faculty and staff at
Hamilton Elementary School in La Crosse, Wisconsin.
Her wisdom for others reflects her life: “be honest, be true to yourself, find a way to discuss issues, both positive and negative, be willing to take a “no” now and then, and accept the hard things and work through them. And love where you are!”
Sister Mildred participates in Mass held in Mary of the Angels Chapel.