June Regina St James - Pfouts

June Regina (Aaron) St James-Pfouts, 89, of Boise, ID passed from this life to God’s eternal kingdom Sunday, September 13, 2026.

A Rosary service will be held at 10:30 am followed by a celebration of the Catholic Holy Mass of Christian Burial at 11:00 am, Tuesday, October 6, 2026 at St. John's Cathedral, Boise, Idaho. Interment will follow at Morris Hill Cemetery. Family and friends are invited to gather for a reception at Congregation Ahavath Beth Israel immediately following the graveside service.

June entered this life on June 26, 1937, the younger of two children born to Hayman Aaron, an Orthodox Hungarian Jew and professional orchestra pit musician, and Mary Ann Elizabeth (James) Aaron, an Irish Catholic and Ziegfeld Follies chorus line dancer. Unsurprising for the day, her parents’ 1929 marriage was front page news in the New York Daily Variety and set the early stage for June’s independent lifelong faith journey.

Though born in The Bronx, June was never a city girl. A westerner in later years, she identified most closely and was shaped by her early life in rural Long Island. It was there that her seafaring maternal grandfather of English and Scottish descent introduced her to literature, celestial navigation, and weather patterns, instilling in her a lifelong passion for reading and learning.

It was also there on Long Island that - by the grace of God acting through the Babylon Convent Mother Superior - she was introduced as a young girl to the Catholic Church and the enduring love of Jesus Christ, a revelatory love denied in her religiously fractured home. This love, coupled with a reverence and devotion to the Blessed Mary, and a deep and abiding faith in God, carried her with grace through life’s many challenges.

No story of June’s life, however brief, would be complete without mention of the road tar that ran through her veins. Among the legacies passed down to her, which she in turn passed down to several of her children, was a willingness and desire to hop in a car on a moment's notice and drive cross country just to see what was on the other side.

On the other end of one such road trip in 1951 was Los Angeles, where the family moved and June’s love of history, writing, and geology was inspired and nurtured. This love fed her aspiration of becoming an English teacher after graduating from Venice High School in 1955.

Life, however, held other plans, so she exchanged college and career aspirations for the life of a working mother. That life brought as many interesting jobs as it did different places to live, but she was always a mom first. No matter what difficulties life presented, she managed to provide for her family. She was fiercely independent and an inspirational model of resilience.

Besides family, her lifelong passion was music, particularly choral music. From her early teens until reluctantly yielding to the choir loft stairs, she rejoiced in church and community choirs such as the San Francisco Bach Choir, the San Francisco Irish Choral Society, and Boise’s Majors and Minors.

As June became increasingly homebound, she turned her considerable attention and devotion to the Carmelite Secular Community. Among the Carmelites she found a supportive sisterhood and a focus for her prayer life that nurtured her to her end.

June was preceded in death by her husbands Donald K. Brinkmann and Ralph William (Bill) Pfouts; parents, Hayman (Hyman) and Mary Aaron; brother Robert Carlton; and eldest daughter, Colleen Wiley Ray.

June is survived by her son Allan Thunes and wife, Colleen, and their five children, Christopher, Carly, Connor, Carter, and Corey of Apex, North Carolina; daughter Allison Thunes of Boise, Idaho; son Leland Thunes of Oakland, California; daughter Cecilia Thunes and children Ahniya and Theodore of Boise, Idaho; son Owen Thunes and daughter, Felicity, of Gilbert, Arizona; and grandchildren Justin Shepard of Humble, Texas and Akela (Eldridge) Silkman of North Chesterfield, Virginia (children of the late Colleen); and six great grandchildren.

In lieu of flowers, please consider memorial donations to the Cathedral of St John The Evangelist, The Idaho Humane Society, the Idaho Food Bank, The Fatima Center, or the Southwest Indian Foundation Stove Program.

The family would like to acknowledge the patient and loving care provided to June by the caregivers and staff at Morningstar Senior Living, St Luke’s Hospital, Sunterra Springs Riverview, and Shaw Mountain in Boise, and her in-person reunion with her beloved Catholic community at Morningstar.