Missionary who devoted years to education

A retired missionary who devoted more than 40 years to spreading the Catholic faith in Taiwan, the United States and her hometown of Hong Kong has died at the age of 84.

Sister Bernardine Remedios died on October 17 in California at the retirement home of the Maryknoll Sisters, the religious order which educated her as a child and with which she served as an educator and worked as a financial official.

She was born in Kowloon on July 25, 1930 to Fernando and Carmen Osmund Remedios, and used to describe her family as "fourth-generation Macau islanders". She spoke of having to switch between English, Chinese and Portuguese at family reunions.

She graduated from Maryknoll Convent School in Kowloon Tong in 1948, but would later go on to join the Maryknoll Sisters, the New York-based religious order created in 1912.

Before beginning her religious life - during which she went by the name Carmen Fernanda Remedios - she worked as a secretary for the aviation division of Jardine's, now known as Jardine Aviation Service.

But in 1956 she entered Maryknoll's home convent, or motherhouse, in New York. She took her initial vows in 1959 before being assigned to work in the town of Houlong, western Taiwan, a year later.

She spent nine years teaching religious education there, before returning to New York to study for a degree in education at Mary Rogers College.