One of their cars, a blue Toyota Corolla, was missing.
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Two Catholic Nuns found, killed; now police are trying to find out who did it.
They were identified as Sister Paula Merrill, of the SCN in Kentucky, and Sister Margaret Held, with the School Sisters of St. Francis in Milwaukee.
Their bodies have been taken to a state crime lab for autopsies, Holmes County Coroner Dexter Howard said.
The women’s bodies were found on Thursday morning after they failed to appear at a nearby clinic where they provided flu jabs, insulin and other medical care for children and adults who can not afford to pay for medicine.
“These were the two sweetest sisters you could imagine”, the Rev. Greg Plata said.
Church officials said the sisters also regularly distributed books, school supplies and other items to the poor.
The Catholic Diocese of Jackson said the nuns ran the Lexington Medical Clinic.
Warren Strain, a spokesman for the Mississippi Department of Public Safety, said the vehicle was found abandoned Thursday evening on a secluded street barely a mile from the home, The Associated Press reported. He said police haven’t determined when the auto was abandoned, and that it was being towed to the state crime lab near Jackson, Mississippi’s capital city.
Authorities did not release a motive for the killings and it was not clear if the nuns’ religious work had anything to do with the attack.
Durant police and the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation are investigating the deaths.
“We just see patients and do what needs to be done”, Sister Paula said in the video.
According to Facebook page for the School Sisters of St. Francis, the two spent more than 30 years ministering in MS and helping the disadvantaged. He said previous year she joined him and her brother and sister to visit several sites in Europe.
She went to Catholic school throughout her childhood, attending Our Lady of Nazareth Academy in Wakefield, run until 2009 by the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth.
“We visited all the holy sites, obviously”, he said.
“I always introduced her to people as my sister the Sister”, Rosemarie Merrill said.
“These sisters have spent years of dedicated service here in Mississippi. They’ll give you the shirt off their back”, she said.
Sister Paula saw children and adults and helped in other ways.
“We do more social work than medicine sometimes”, she told The Journey.
The sisters were involved in caring for the community after Hurricane Katrina in 2005 left much of the town without power for weeks.
“They would treat them for free”, he said.
The small congregation at St. Thomas typically gathered on Thursday nights for Bible study and a meal.
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On its website, the Sisters of Charity of Nazareth confirmed the deaths, and asked people to “Pray in gratitude for the precious lives of Sisters Paula and Margaret”. Both nuns were nurse practitioners who lived in her quiet, rural community of Durant while helping provide medical care in the poor region.
