Officials said there were signs of a break in and the nuns’ vehicle was missing.
Advertisement
Their bodies were found in a home they shared in Durant, on Castalian Springs Road.
Department of Public Safety spokesman Warren Strain said the autopsies would be done Friday on Sister Margaret Held and Sister Paula Merrill.
Durant Assistant Police Chief James Lee says his department received a request around 10 Thursday morning to make a wellness check at the home after the woman didn’t arrive at work.
A auto had been taken from the property, but authorities found it abandoned nearby. “Because we are gospel women, please also pray for the perpetrators”. They describe themselves as an worldwide congregation who are “committed to work for justice in solidarity with oppressed peoples, especially the economically poor and women, and to care for the earth”.
Ms Held worked for 49 years with the School Sisters of St Francis, which said they were “deeply shocked and grieved” by her death.
“When they saw things that didn’t look right, they called police”, she said. And as authorities search for the killer, many residents wonder how they will fill the hole the women’s deaths have left. And they didn’t bother anybody.
During an early part of her career, she helped bring a tuberculosis outbreak under control in the region, Dew said.
Authorities said that it appears the sisters were shot at their home in Durant, Miss.
Sister Margaret Held, one of the two nuns killed this week in MS, studied nursing at Creighton University in the 1980s.
Officers are also checking local surveillance cameras for any unusual activity in the small town, Durant Police Chief John Haynes said, according to The AP.
“We are terribly saddened to have to announce the murder of two sisters in our diocese”.
Sisters Merrill and Held had not come into the clinic, about 60 miles (97 km) northeast of Jackson, on Thursday morning.
Sisters Margaret Held and Paula Merrill were nurse practitioners who dedicated their lives to providing health care to people in the poorest county in the state.
Sister Gatz said the deaths do have one silver lining – they help the SCNs to be in solidarity with others who have lost a loved one to violence.
Michael O’Loughlin with the School Sisters of St. Francis met Sister Held during a visit to Wisconsin.
“They were two of the sweetest, most gentle women you can imagine. It’s so senseless”, Father Greg Plata, OFM, told a reporter on the scene.
The two were nurse practitioners in Holmes County, where they worked with families who are struggling financially.
“We had that hurricane Katrina, and didn’t nobody have gas over here but them”.
On Thursday, the two nuns were found dead in the MS community they quietly served for decades, authorities said.
Speaking from her Stoneham home August 26, Rosemarie Merrill recalled her sister as, “a fun loving person and a very giving and caring person”.
“They were earthly angels with hearts of pure gold”, said Rosalind McChriston-Williams, a nurse who worked with them at UMMC Holmes County.
“We hope justice will be swiftly served”.
Advertisement
Join us on our podcast each weekday for an interesting story, well told, from Charisma News.
