Sister Josephine (Jo) Lucker
Current Mission Location – Maryknoll Sisters Center- Maryknoll, NY
A member of the pioneer El Paso,Texas Magoffin family, Josephine Lucker was born in Tienjin, China, August 7, 1933 of North American parents, Harriet (Glasgow) Lucker and Harry A. Lucker, and grew up in El Paso. She had 3 brothers. In 1950, Josephine, ‘Jo,’ graduated from Georgetown Visitation High School in Georgetown, IN. She graduated from St. Mary’s College, Notre Dame, IN with a Bachelor of Arts in Sociology in 1954. In 1975 she earned a Masters of Arts in Religious Studies from Mundelein College, Chicago, IL.
Jo entered the Maryknoll Sisters at their Valley Park, MO novitiate February 1, 1955. Sister Josephine professed First Vows September 8, 1957 at Valley Park and Final Vows September 7, 1963 in Tanzania.
Sister Jo was assigned her first overseas mission to Africa in 1958. Her first ministries were in secondary schools for girls in Tanzania, where fewer than 100 women were high school graduates when Tanzania gained its independence.
Sister Jo also served at the East African Pastoral Institute in Uganda and Kenya, where she prepared secondary school religious education material as a catechetical team member responsible for giving workshops in 20 countries in Africa. She continued seminars in Zimbabwe and with two Zimbabwean Sisters, published catechetical material in a book entitled Sharing God’s Living Word in Community. Then, Sister Jo helped pioneer the Maryknoll Sisters’ presence in Namibia.
She was assigned to El Salvador in 1997 and in 2004 was assigned to the Western U. S. Region and lived in El Paso as a member of the Maryknoll Missioners Border Team collaborative support group of Sisters, priests and lay missioners. She previously shared this mutuality of Maryknoll charisms in El Salvador.
Sister Jo also served as paralegal at Las Americas Immigration Advocacy Center, working with another Maryknoll Sister as co-coordinators of a program authorized by the Violence Against Women Act. They helped undocumented women, who had married U.S. citizens or legal permanent residents who had become violent, self petition for their U.S. legal status. The majority came from Mexico and communicated in Spanish.
Sister Jo later became a member of the Maryknoll Sisters Western U.S. Region and lived in El Paso as a member of the Maryknoll Missioners Border Team, a collaborative support group of Sisters, priests and lay missioners. She previously shared this mutuality of Maryknoll charisms in El Salvador. Sister Jo also participated in a spirituality group comprised of other women who worked on the border.
In August 2011, Sister Jo joined the retirement community of Maryknoll Sisters in Monrovia, California and in 1916 she moved from Monrovia to retire at the Sisters Center in NY.