Catherine E. Frerichs

Catherine Elizabeth Frerichs, 21 August 1945 – 28 January 2022, was born in Monterey Park, California, to Albert and Sylvia Frerichs.  A few months later, her father, a missionary pastor, left for the South Pacific to resume work cut off by World War II. The following year Catherine, her mother and older brother joined him on the island of New Guinea. Life would take her from there to Australia, to Nebraska and Minnesota, to Israel-Palestine and South Sudan, and to Michigan.  

Leadings of the heart – tempered by compassion, by duty and by faith – would be her compass on life’s way. 

Catherine embraced life as a woman of her era and a citizen of the world. She became a teacher, educator, writer and administrator.  Sent away to school at the age of six, she would never again live with her original family for an extended period of time. The lifelong big sister of that scattered family, she also made her own family as step mother, adoptive mother and foster mother.  She was a good neighbor and a Good Samaritan, at home and in faraway places. 

Wherever she lived, Catherine worked to be part of the community, and was ready to help build it if necessary.  In Grand Rapids, she joined a co-housing project, served on the vestry of St. Mark’s Episcopal Church, sang in various choirs, and helped monitor national elections. She led community education groups in book discussions and writing much like she did in her career as a college professor.

She was drawn to the outdoors because it felt natural from growing up in the tropics. With family and friends, she enjoyed the woods and lakes of Michigan, the Grand Canyon, the Serengeti, Machu Picchu and Hudson’s Bay.

She opened her heart and her home in Grand Rapids to refugees from Sudan.  Among local families welcoming them, she was the first to be licensed to take unaccompanied minors.

She had been sent away from home for elementary school in New Guinea. For high school she went to Brisbane, Australia; college took her to Northfield, Minnesota; and graduate school to Ann Arbor, Michigan.

She was drawn to understand these painful separations which began so early in her life. Constructive whenever possible, Catherine researched and wrote a book about that quest, Desires of the Heart: A Daughter Remembers Her Missionary Parents. “Writing the book,” she concluded, “was an experience of grace in the Christian sense.  Through understanding how I came to be sent away, I was able to come home.”

Catherine Frerichs is survived by her son James Lamb, her foster children Debora Makuei, Mach Makuei and Deng Mach, her step children Scott Lamb, Karen Lamb, Cecille Eaton, Adele Denison, Brant Lamb and Denise Lamb, and siblings Angela, Jonathan, Paul and Peter Frerichs and Ruth Imbrock.  She is preceded in death by her parents and her brother David Frerichs. 

Catherine’s professional career focused on teaching, writing, faculty development, women’s studies, multicultural learning and minority engagement.  She was a professor of writing and English at Grand Valley State University in Grand Rapids and directed the Pew Faculty Teaching and Learning Center there.  She was a visiting professor at Divine Word University in Papua New Guinea.  She served as a senior program officer of the Great Lakes Colleges Association in Ann Arbor, MI.

Catherine taught at Albion College in Albion MI, and directed the Anna Howard Shaw Women’s Center there.  She led the Great Lakes Jerusalem Program, an inter-disciplinary encounter with aspects of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.  Her career in education began as an instructor in English at Glen Oaks Community College, Centreville, MI.

Catherine was a 1967 graduate of St. Olaf College, Northfield, MN.  She earned a Master of Arts in English at the University of Chicago and a Doctor of Arts in English at the University of Michigan.

Catherine authored numerous publications and papers, and gave many presentations, about teaching, writing, English, education and the roles of women in these fields and beyond.  She had completed much of the work on a new book, Worlds Burst Open: An American Mother and Her Sudanese Children—before her life was taken by cancer,

As friend, parent, sister and teacher, she gave of her life to nurture, assist and encourage others. She opened her home. She explored cross-cultural living. Her various callings in Michigan had something in common with her roots in Papua New Guinea. 

A service in celebration of Catherine Frerichs’ life will be held at 2pm on May 7 at St. Mark’s Episcopal Church, 134 North Division Ave., Grand Rapids, Michigan 49503 with visitation at the church from 1-2pm.

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