Mary Cathleen Schanzer 

Dr. Mary Cathleen “Cathy” Schanzer, age 73, of Athens PA, died Wednesday evening, June 4, 2025, at home, in the arms of her husband, Tom Lewis, after a 27-month battle with Glioblastoma. Cathy is survived by her husband Tom, their eight children Patrick, Robyn, Angie, Robert, Michael, Brian, Mary and Daniel, and their families including 21 grandchildren and 14 great grandchildren. Cathy was the third of eight children born to Luke and Ernestine Schanzer of Hitchcock Texas.

Cathy loved life and loved being a wife, a mother, a doctor and a friend. She had a brilliant forty-year career as an ophthalmologist, performing many thousands of eye surgeries in Houston TX, Memphis TN, and Sayre PA. She also had an extraordinary passion for mission work in Africa, where she performed over 10,000 eye operations and established a permanent charity eye clinic in the remote village of Serabu, Sierra Leone. Cathy’s mission work expanded beyond eye care to provide food, water, education, and community activities for culture, sports and faith sharing, to underserved, poverty-stricken people of West Africa. Cathy’s dream of mission work in Africa began when she was in the third grade and became a reality with her first mission expedition in 1988. During her 37 years of mission work, millions of lives have been impacted and Southern Eye Clinic of Serabu continues to be one of the busiest eye clinics in West Africa.

Cathy’s driving force for her zest of life was her love of God and her desire to be the serving arms of Jesus Christ. Cathy received numerous national and international humanitarian recognition awards for her mission work, including Catholic Doctor of the Year in 2024. She had a strong and studied faith, and maintained an active presence in the Catholic Church as a daily communicant, a Dame of Magisterial Grace of the Sovereign Order of Malta, a Lady of the Equestrian Order of the Holy Sepulcher of Jerusalem, a Third Order Dominican Associate, a member of numerous leadership committees for her church diocese and her church parish, and served as a Eucharistic Minister at Sunday Mass. She suffered greatly during her bout with brain cancer and offered all of her suffering as a prayer intention for her family and friends, that they may grow closer to Jesus Christ and His Church.

Cathy will be buried at Subiaco Abbey, a Benedictine Monastery in Arkansas. Memorial Services for Cathy in Sayre PA include a community Rosary service on June 24^th at 6 PM at Lowery-Urban Funeral Home (225 S Main, Athens PA), followed by prayers and Mass on June 25^th, beginning at 2 PM at Church of the Epiphany (304 S Elmer Ave, Sayre PA). Additional Memorial Services will be held in Nashville TN, Memphis TN, Hitchcock TX, Irving TX, Subiaco AK, and Serabu Sierra Leone. For more information consult the website: Serabu.com.

Cathy’s family requests mission donations in lieu of flowers. Please send donations to: Southern Eye Institute, P.O. Box 771317, Memphis TN, 38177. Southern Eye Institute is a 501C3 Charity Organization.