Jun 29, 2018 4 min read

The Rev. Cathy Peternel can’t go to the grocery store without being approached by someone who has been a patient at Canonsburg Hospital, where she served as chaplain before last Friday.

She doesn’t always remember their names or even their faces, but they remember hers without fail.

“When you touch people when they’re hurting, they don’t forget,” Peternel said.

After 28 years of pastoring to the sick and comforting grieving families at the hospital in Washington County, Peternel is moving to Indianapolis from her home in McDonald to minister to elderly parishioners at her son’s church.

This week, the Greater Canonsburg Houston Ministerial Association will interview candidates to replace Peternel, but President Jim O’Brien said it will be difficult to find someone who is as committed to the hospital as she is.

“She’s definitely going to be sorely missed,” he said.

Shirley Dempster, who has volunteered with Peternel’s ministry at the hospital since retiring as a nurse in 1996, likened the chaplain to the Energizer Bunny. Her fellow volunteer, Sandy Galambus, was quick to agree.

“We always ask her, ‘Do your batteries still work, Cathy?'” said Galambus, who has volunteered at the ministry for more than six years. “And she just keeps chugging along.”

Every day, Peternel visited patients who were preparing to undergo surgery and those who were staying in the intensive care unit to offer comfort and a prayer. For 15 years, she also held a bimonthly seminar for members of the community struggling with the death of a loved one.

Peternel emphasized that her ministry would not be successful if not for her volunteers, a team of 28 tight-knit individuals. Every day, Peternel charged her volunteers with visiting the newly-admitted patients so that they could ensure each person at the hospital would be reached.

The ministry’s volunteers run the gamut of Christian denominations. On Wednesdays, a Lutheran works alongside Protestants and a Eucharist minister. But after years of volunteering together, Peternel said they became a family.

“They have melted together so you wouldn’t know they’re not from one church,” she said.

Dempster credits Peternel for the group’s closeness. Peternel hosted parties for her volunteers twice a year to introduce those who worked on different days and made sure that everyone had a homemade nut roll come Christmastime.

Peternel’s care for her volunteers extended beyond baking them treats. Since beginning to volunteer with the ministry in 1981, David Garrison has had two heart attacks, a heart transplant and a kidney transplant. When his health took a turn for the worst, Peternel prayed with him over the phone as he sat in the emergency room or the intensive care unit.

“She always has your back, she always has your front,” he said. “She remembers your birthday. She just always takes care of you.”

Many of the ministry’s volunteers were recruited by Peternel after they attended one of her seminars on mourning. Ron Tritschler considered suicide after his wife died, but Peternel encouraged him to volunteer with her. He said this work gave his life a new purpose.

“Cathy took me under her wing,” he said. “I can’t thank her enough.”

Many tears were shed over the course of Peternel’s last week with her volunteers. For more than two decades, Peternel said Canonsburg Hospital has been like her parish.

“Even though you know something might be the will of God, it doesn’t make it any easier,” she said, her eyes brimming with tears. “There are just a lot of people who I love and who I’m going to miss.”