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Rita was born the eighth and youngest child of John and Otylia Partyka at home in Scranton, PA on January 3, 1934. On January 21, Rita was baptized at Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary Church in South Side Scranton. Growing in a loving, welcoming environment, Rita remembers going to Church hand in hand with her dad and also the harmonious singing sessions with her brothers and sisters while doing dishes and cleaning the house.
When time came for Rita to begin her schooling, she was enrolled in Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary School, run by the Sisters of the Holy Family of Nazareth. Around the end of her sophomore year in high school, Rita felt called to religious life. On June 24, 1949, Rita departed for Torresdale, PA, where she was welcomed by the then provincial superior, Sister M. Neomisia. Just fifteen years old, Rita was accepted as a postulant on June 27, 1949, and completed her high school education at Nazareth Academy.
On January 8, 1950, Feast of the Holy Family, Rita was accepted into the novitiate and was given the name of Sister M. Perpetua. Professing her first vows on January 12, 1952, Sister Perpetua was then assigned to St. Stanislaus School, Brooklyn, NY, where she ministered until 1959.
On January 4, 1958, professing her perpetual vows, Sister M. Perpetua, added to her name the mystery that had come to reveal to her God’s merciful and tender love for her, Jesus Crucified.
From 1959 to 1962 she taught at St. Cunegunda's School in McAdoo, PA. While assigned in 1962 as submistress in Meadowbrook, Sister completed her college education, receiving in 1965 a BA in English from Holy Family College. Shortly after that, Sister Perpetua was assigned to Colegio Espíritu Santo in Puerto Rico where she spent the next 13 years, first as a high school English teacher and then from 1972 to 1978 as superior and high school principal. It was during her time in Puerto Rico, that the sisters were permitted to return to their baptismal names if they so desired and so, Sister Perpetua became known as Sister Rita just about the time she became principal.
Sister Rita also spent some summers at the University of Scranton and completed her MA in English. Named Mistress of Novices in August of 1978, Sister Rita then headed to Meadowbrook for the second time. Over the next five years she would witness the birth of the Association of the Holy Family in Philadelphia and the formation of F.I.A.T. (Family Life in Action and Truth), which was formally recognized in 1980.
In 1983, after the election of the then provincial superior, Sister M. Celeste Slowik as Superior General, Sister Rita was appointed Provincial Superior of Immaculate Conception Province. When her term as provincial was completed in 1989, Sister was then assigned as Superior of the CSFN mission in the Philippines. She also taught English to some of the Polish Sisters at the Generalate, composed and edited the Nazareth Unity newsletter and prepared the booklet of Mass and prayers for the Feast of our Martyred Sisters.
In 2001, her term as Assistant General completed, S. Rita returned to Philadelphia and served as superior of Jesus of Nazareth Convent (Mt. Nazareth) for three years. In 2004, she was transferred to Immaculate Conception Convent (the Provincialate) as Assistant Archivist in anticipation of the extensive archival work to be completed as the five American provinces prepared for reconfiguration.
Upon returning to Mt. Nazareth in 2009, Sister Rita became the Mid-Atlantic Area Director of the Association of the Holy Family and the spiritual advisor of two of the ten groups of Associates in the area until she retired in 2019.
On Tuesday, April 29, 2025, at 7:15 pm, in the presence of three of her sisters, she peacefully and softly breathed her last on earth and found herself in the arms of her beloved Jesus Crucified, now Risen forever.
