Two nuns who helped poor found slain in home
Both were nurses in rural Mississippi
DURANT, Miss. — Two nuns who worked as nurses and helped the poor in rural Mississippi were found slain in their home, perhaps victims of a break-in and vehicle theft, officials said Thursday.
Authorities would not say if they have a suspect but disclosed that they had recovered a car missing from the home and were towing it to a crime lab for analysis. They also did not release a cause of death, but the Rev. Greg Plata said police told him the sisters were stabbed.
The nuns were identified as Sister Margaret Held and Sister Paula Merrill, both 68. Their bodies were taken to a state crime lab for autopsies.
The women, both nurse practitioners, were found Thursday morning when they didn’t report to work at a nearby clinic, where they provided flu shots, insulin and other medical care for children and adults who couldn’t afford it.
“They were two of the sweetest, most gentle women you can imagine. Their vocation was helping the poor,” said Plata, who oversees a 35-member Catholic church the sisters attended.
Warren Strain, spokesman for the Mississippi Department of Public Safety, said the missing Toyota Corolla was found abandoned Thursday evening on a secluded street barely a mile from the home, the vehicle apparently undamaged. He said police haven’t determined when the car was abandoned.
Authorities didn’t release a motive and it wasn’t clear if the nuns’ religious work had anything to do with the slayings.
“I have an awful feeling in the pit of my stomach,” said Durant Assistant Police Chief James Lee, who is Catholic.
Police Chief John Haynes said officers are checking video from surveillance cameras in town to see if they spot anything unusual.
Merrill had worked in Mississippi for more than 30 years, according to the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth in Kentucky. She was from Massachusetts and joined the order in 1979.
Two years later, she moved to the South and found her calling in the Mississippi Delta community, according to a 2010 article in The Journey, a publication by the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth.
When asked about her ministry, Merrill was humble.
“We simply do what we can wherever God places us,” Merrill said.
Held was a member of the School Sisters of St. Francis based in Milwaukee, and its U.S. Province Leadership team issued a statement that members were “deeply shocked and grieved” by the killings. They noted Held had 49 years with the order and devoted herself to “living her ministry caring for and healing the poor.”
Dr. Elias Abboud worked with the sisters for years and agreed to help build the Lexington Medical Clinic where the sisters worked because “you could feel their passion about serving the people, helping the poor. They loved it.”
Abboud estimated that the clinic provided about 25 percent of all the medical care in the county, which has a population of about 18,000, according to U.S. Census Bureau estimates for July 2015.
The two nuns provided almost all the care at the clinic, and many in the community wondered what would happen to it now — and the people it served.
“I think their absence is going to be felt for a long, long time,” said Lisa Dew, who managed the Lexington clinic. “There’s a lot of people here who depended on them for their care and their medicines. It’s going to be rough.”