Patricia A. Keimig

Patricia A. Keimig was born in Philadelphia, PA – just barely north of and very, very near Maryland. She corrected this minor issue by spending all of her married life in that better State, wedded to a native, and made sure that her only son was born there, along with all her grandchildren. God is merciful.  Prior to those blessed 48 years in Maryland, she grew up under the care of her parents in a number of places due to her father’s Naval service stemming from his WWII days on battleships, and subsequent service as a civilian with the Air Force, taking her and her three younger siblings to places as far flung as San Diego, CA and Isle of Palms, SC. She spent the last years of her teens and early 20s in Fairborn, OH, eventually attending the University of Dayton, where she met her future husband – Dr. Joseph Felix Keimig.  A pure German heritage on his part and a pure Irish heritage on her part, and 25 years of difference in their ages, could not keep them apart.

From their marriage in 1968 to their separation by his death at 95 in 2013, their long years were joined in the love a single little boy, William Joseph, who came along in 1972, and did not stay little for long.  Her work life, begun in her Master’s degree days in service to a U.S. senator’s office, evolved into a career of government service on the Maryland State Health Planning Commission. These decades of public service were their primary household income, and allowed Joe to retire from his role with the Maryland Council for Higher Education, and instead focus as a stay-at-home dad on the education and formation of Billy. Eventually, retirement came for Pat as well, coinciding with their son’s marriage to Heather Jill Wareing, another non-Marylander.

Heather’s devotion to Pat in her last four years of descent into dementia was the latest of many thanksgivings that Pat expressed frequently as her greatest blessing in life after her own husband and son – impactful most importantly due to Heather’s example of faith that restored both Pat and Joe to a devoted Catholic practice.

In retirement, Pat was an RCIA team member for adults who desired to become Catholics at St. Mary’s of Piscataway, Maryland, where her son was Director of Religious Education from 2000-2015. Beginning in 2004, she undertook extensive writing and editing responsibilities for a series of books published by the Association for Catechumenal Ministry, a national organization that assists, supports, and helps improve adult Catholic catechesis in the United States. These books are still helping souls and are used in thousands of parishes.

Along the years, she and Joe took up genealogy, and traveled three times to Bavaria, Germany to seek out family. They also traveled in Switzerland, Austria, Italy, England, and the Holy Land. Obvious to all who knew her, she was remarkable for her passion for the value of history, her uncompromising integrity, her generosity, and her deep energy and zeal for building others up through her own skills and gifts.  But above all the things that she loved about life, there was one thing that she loved more than life: her family.

Pat was preceded in death by her parents, William "Bill" & Margaret Ansley, and her husband of 45 years, Joseph F. Keimig.

She is survived by her siblings Marge Ansley of Tucson, AZ, William "Bill" Ansley of Lake City, MN and Maria Elliott of London, OH, as well as her sister-in-law Marilyn Augst of Lake City, MN and brother-in-law Casey Elliot of London, OH.

Pat had lived with her son, William "Bill" Keimig, daughter-in-law, Heather Keimig and her six grandchildren (Rose, William, Julianna, Theodore, Elizabeth and Gregory) since 2006; they are all still living.

In lieu of flowers, please consider a donation to either of the two evangelical passions in her life – our family’s ministry efforts, currently through the work of the Catechetical Institute (https://franciscanathome.com/donate) or the ministry efforts of Camp Damascus, which has deeply influenced the lives of all six of her grandchildren, and will for years to come (https://www.damascus.net/give#ways-to-give).

Her funeral Mass was live-streamed and can be viewed in these two places:

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