Academics, Athletics, Park Forest, Schools

Sr. Mary Jo Sobieck to Throw Opening Pitch at Saturday’s Crosstown Cup


Sr. Mary Jo Sobieck OP, Rick Renteria, Joe McEwing, Chicago White Sox, Marian Catholic High School
Sr. Mary Jo Sobieck OP with Chicago White Sox Manager Rick Renteria and bench coach Joe McEwing. (Photo: MCHS)

Sr. Mary Jo and the Chicago White Sox, together again.

Chicago Heights, IL-(ENEWSPF)- The Chicago White Sox and Marian Catholic High School announced today that the “Pitching Nun,” Sr. Mary Jo Sobieck OP, will throw out the ceremonial first pitch at Saturday’s Crosstown Cup against the Chicago Cubs.

The game is scheduled to begin at 6:10 p.m. at Guaranteed Rate Field.

Sr. Mary Jo, bicep bounce, baseball
Sr. Mary Jo shows off her signature ball-bicep-bounce Monday at Marian Catholic. (Photo: Mary Compton)

It was just a month ago that Sr. Mary Jo, a theology teacher at Marian Catholic High School, resolutely took the mound at Guaranteed Rate Field and fired a perfect pitch for the ages. Since then, she has appeared on a number of television programs, local and national, including Good Morning America, Fox and Friends, NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt, WGN in Chicago, local stations across the United States, and international news stations.

And she’s just getting started.

Sr. Mary Jo Sobiek, Dominican, students, Marian Catholic
Sister Mary Jo Sobiek, O.P., with students at Marian Catholic in Chicago Heights. (Photo: Mary Compton)

Through it all, Sr. Mary Jo has maintained her focus, speaking highly of Marian Catholic in Chicago Heights. In response to the first question she received from Good Morning America host Michael Strahan, she managed to mention “Marian Catholic” twice in the same sentence, “Marian Catholic had a Marian Catholic night with the White Sox, a promotional game. It’s the 60th Anniversary of our school. Our sisters founded the school in 1958. So, to celebrate that, the administration asked me to throw out the pitch as one of the sisters who are still here, sixty years after that founding.

Sr. Mary Jo consistently says she is most at home with her students at Marian Catholic in Chicago Heights.

https://twitter.com/whitesox/status/1030955337908711426

Sr. Mary Jo provided a response on Good Morning America that, I believe, sums up so much of her personal philosophy, her values, when it comes to education, Marian Catholic, which she exhibits, makes evident, as she reaches out to every student, every day.

“Well, as an athlete, you got to be ‘all in.’ And I knew that my coaches and my teammates when they saw that would be like, ‘What are you doing? Wimping-out, man!’ You gotta do the real thing. It’s all or nothing. So, I had to do it from the top.”

Sr. Mary Jo, and Marian Catholic, “all in” for every student, every day.

Sr. Mary Jo Sobiek, Chicago White Sox, first pitch,. Marian Catholic
Sr. Mary Jo Sobiek, O.P. resolutely takes the mound in August at Guaranteed Rate Field. (Photo: Gary Kopycinski)

The National Bobblehead Hall of Fame has designed a bobblehead honoring Sr. Mary Jo’s first pitch:

Sister Mary Jo Sobieck, Marian Catholic High School, Bobblehead
The Sister Mary Jo Marian Catholic High School Bobblehead. (National Bobblehead Hall of Fame)

You can pre-order your Sister Mary Jo Marian Catholic Bobblehead here, with expected delivery in December. $5 from every Sister Mary Jo Bobblehead sold goes to Marian Catholic High School.

From CBS Chicago:

Make a donation to Marian Catholic High School here.

The writer is an educator in his 29th year at Marian Catholic High School in Chicago Heights, Illinois. He’s very luck to teach in a classroom next to Sr. Mary Jo Sobieck, OP.

Related: Opening Pitch Seen ‘Round the World: Marian Catholic’s Sr. Mary Jo to Appear on Good Morning America


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