Religious education director retires after 25 years

Intermountain Catholic

+ Enlarge

Bea McBride

MIDVALE – "You can hear the smile in Bea McBride’s voice when she speaks," said Shelly Valdez, Blessed Sacrament youth minister.

That smile won’t be heard by the children as often after June 30 at Saint Therese of the Child Jesus Parish, from which McBride is retiring after more than 25 years as a religious education director.

"I love Bea; she is such a wonderful person," said Valdez. "Every year we sponsor families from St. Therese in The Gift of the Drummer program for Christmas because our parish started from St. Therese. Bea helps us so much; she knows all the people so well. She is definitely someone I look up to."

"Bea is an invaluable resource to the parish," said Father Martin Diaz, pastor. "She is able to relate to the children in a welcoming manner, she is dedicated to religious education and the Church, dedicated to helping the children grow in their faith and meet the various needs of the parents. If a child had special needs, Bea met those needs. She was a good lay leader and served on many councils."

McBride taught at Guadalupe Parish in Salt Lake City before going to St. Therese in 1987. "After commuting from Sandy to Rose Park and praying my way home during the winter months, I decided to look for a job closer to home," she said. "Father James Semple (now deceased) hired me at St. Therese."

McBride started teaching religious education to pre-school children at Maria Goretti Parish in Arlington, Texas, when she was in her 20s. "It’s been a part of my adult life, and I love it," said McBride, who grew up in Steamboat Springs, Colo. "We did not have a church there, so they held Mass in the school gym. I used to love the Sisters of Loretto, who came from Denver, Colo., for two weeks in the summer to teach us."

After McBride got married and her children were old enough to enter religious education, she began her career. "I had a wonderful experience with the religious education leaders and Fr. Riley from Ireland," she said. "The program was set up so great that they used to pay the catechists back in 1968. But what impressed me the most was that we had a lot of training and at the end of the year they held a banquet for us that Bishop (T. K.) Gorman, from the Forth Worth area, attended. That impressed me that they thought that much of the catechists."

McBride taught in Texas for four years before moving to Colorado, where she taught for two more years. When she moved to Salt Lake City, she was a substitute teacher at Saint Ambrose Parish before moving to Sandy. "I went to Blessed Sacrament Parish, where I received a lot of training," she said. "I also went to Saint Thomas More Parish when it started in about 1981. I remember Sister Delores from Holy Cross Ministries who gave us more training. Sr. Delores told me I could be a coordinator, and I told her, ‘Oh, never.’ Then I took the Master Catechists training and went to Guadalupe."

McBride has watched the religious education program at St. Therese grow over the years. When she started, they held classes in a small house they shared with the St. Therese food bank and also used rooms in the basement of the office. "Now we have our own building and our parish is mostly Hispanic. Luckily I am bilingual," she said. "I’ve worked under five priests and they’ve all brought their own qualities to the parish."