BUFFALO, N.Y. — Each week on Sunday Daybreak, we like to shine a light on those Western New Yorkers who have made an impact on their families, friends and communities. This week 2 On Your Side contributor Larry Haneberg pays tribute to Maria Theresa Frieri and her life well lived.
"I have studied the Qur'an. I have studied the bible. I have studied all the great religious literature out there and I am here to tell you there is no more spiritual document in the world than the United States Constitution," said Dr. Lisa Stephens, quoting Maria Theresa Frieri, known as Mariete.
Stephens says Mariete was her neighbor, friend, and adopted mother.
Mariete also spent 30 years working with Opportunities Unlimited of Niagara, eventually as board member and President.
"Through the unspeakable grief that she and her husband had experienced in having two developmentally disabled daughters, they realized they were learning a lot, and wound up devoting their lives to this cause," Stephens said.
But that cause wasn't the only thing Mariete was devoted to.
"I think Mariete was the classic wonderful immigrant story," Stephens said.
The daughter of a French colonel, she was born in Lebanon. After earning degrees in Beirut and from the Sorbonne in Paris, she taught at small catholic girls schools in Tripoli and the Suez Canal Zone.
"But she then came to the United States and eventually studied and taught at the University of Buffalo," Stephens said.
And also at ECC.
Mariete earned many awards and honors, but also the undying gratitude of the many she mentored, and the many she helped.
"She was incredibly gifted in being able to persuade why it's so important to invest in services for the developmentally disabled in our own community," Stephens said.
Maria Theresa Frieri was an educator, advocate, wife, mother, mentor and friend. She wove all of those into the fabric of a Life Well Lived.