Sharing Our Faith SISTER GENEVIEVE DAVEY IBVM 1928-2022 Sr Genevieve Davey ibvm was a muchloved member of the Institute of the Blessed Virgin Mary community and a familiar figure around the Loreto Kirribilli campus which she made her home for more than 30 years. Sr Genevieve had a presence, with a formidable list of achievements that belied her diminutive stature and mild, gracious manner. Born in Ballarat, Victoria in 1928, Genevieve - or Mary Cecily as she was known then - was the tenth of 11 children to parents William and Kathleen Davey. Education was of prime importance to her parents and Genevieve first attended St. Joseph’s parish school, run by Loreto nuns, and afterwards Loreto College. After school, Genevieve embarked on teacher training, and, deciding to enter religious life, joined the Loreto Sisters as a novice in 1946. She made her First Vows in 1948, taking the religious name of Genevieve with the motto 'The love of Christ urges me on'. Thus began her vocation as an educator and pastoral carer which spanned more than half a century. In that time, Sr Genevieve completed a Bachelor of Science at the University of Melbourne, a Diploma of Educational Administration, was Principal of St. Joseph’s in Ballarat and Loreto College Portland, and was instrumental in the establishment of the ecumenical, co-educational secondary school Christian Community College (now Bayview College).
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The love of Christ urges me on. Sr Genevieve was keen to promote the study of Science at Loreto schools and introduced a new program in Biology at Mandeville Hall in the 1960s. While at Portland in the 1980s, Sr Genevieve arranged housing, furniture, food and clothing for the wave of Vietnamese refugees who arrived by boat after the Vietnam war. During her time in Brisbane, Sr Genevieve helped create a volunteer school for disadvantaged students, a project she embraced with her usual gusto, achieving heartening results. In 1992, the centenary year of the Loreto sisters coming to Sydney, Sr Genevieve curated the centenary display at Loreto Kirribilli and took on the role as Archivist as a result. She combined this with pastoral work with the frail and elderly in the inner city suburbs of Redfern and Waterloo. Sr Genevieve was a true Mary Ward woman, a seeker of truth and a doer of justice, giving ‘something more than ordinary’ in her long and faith-filled life.
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