Two nuns found slain in Miss. home
Women attended meetings in Memphis
Associated Press
Two nuns who worked as nurses and helped the poor in rural Mississippi were found slain in their home, and there were signs of a break-in and their vehicle was missing, officials said Thursday.
Authorities would not say if they have a suspect or what kind of vehicle is missing from the nuns’ home. They also did not release a cause of death, but Rev. Greg Plata said police told him the sisters were stabbed in their home about 150 miles south of Memphis.
The nuns were identified as Sister Margaret Held and Sister Paula Merrill, who used to live in Holly Springs and often attended meetings at Pax Christi Memphis, according to a woman who knows them.
“I am heartbroken and shocked” to learn of the deaths, Pax Christi member Janice Vanderhaar said in an email. “For years they attended PCM when they lived closer to Memphis. If ever their were two saints doing extraordinary work for the poor, it was Paula and Margaret.”
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.
Authorities didn’t release a motive and it wasn’t clear if the nuns’ Nuns Paula Merrill (left) and Margaret Held were nurse practitioners in Holmes County. 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 canvassing the area and trying to look at video from surveillance cameras in town to see if they spot anything unusual.
Merrill, 68, 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.
A video on the order’s website detailed her work, interviewing her and her patients talking about the care they had received.
“What really appalls me is over 60 percent of the children live in poverty,” Merrill said.
During an early part of her career, she helped bring a tuberculosis outbreak under control in the region, said Lisa Dew, who managed the Lexington Medical Clinic where the sisters worked.