Oiapoque, Amapá BRASIL -- Sister Dorothy used this sweater for years. Seldom when in the Amazon region, which is mostly hot. Not long after her passing in 2005, it was given to me. I have used it since then rarely, except on trips to cooler regions. But I did wear it at every trial of Dorothy’s assassins because of the air conditioning. I was called a character witness in some of them, and Dorothy’s sweater, besides keeping me warm, brought her closer, keeping me focused and calm. I remembered Elijah passing his mantle and mission to Elisha (1 Kings 19:19-21 and 2 Kings 2:8-14).
I met Dorothy on her first departure to our mission in Brazil. The following year, I was on Dorothy’s former mission in Arizona, working with migrant farmworkers and Mexican-American youth groups and teaching grade school. I heard great praise for Dorothy and her work wherever I went.
Three years later, I was missioned to Brazil, to the same community as Dorothy (Coroatá, Maranhão). Dorothy was my mentor as we worked in the small communities in more remote areas. I learned so much from her! The first thing she gave me was a copy of the laws regarding the distribution and use of the land. We helped the people form a union to defend their rights amid the military dictatorship that was very cruel. During this time, the Transamazon Highway had been inaugurated, and many farmers working as tenants in Maranhão were going west to try to get their land. When the farmworkers’ union was strong and well organized, Dot suggested we accompany our people in this new territory. We followed the people to Marabá in the state of Pará, where the dictatorship had built a new Army base to control the migrants and suppress the action of human rights activists who were hiding in the jungles as they worked to combat the dictatorship by conscientization and organization to help the newcomers protect their rights. As the road crossed the whole state and the former tenant farmers cultivated their small tracts of land, others took advantage of the work already done, grabbing up the farmers’ land. All of this brought aggression to the Native Peoples, the first inhabitants of the immense Amazon Forest. Dot and I, and our people, faced many new challenges, and we learned a lot together.
As the Transamazon Highway extended further, Dorothy followed the people going west to the Xingu, and I went to live among the indigenous people. Though far apart, our friendship deepened and grew.
I hope that this simple sweater will remind you of this wonderful woman who was strong yet gentle, who loved all, who sought to bring out the good that she was convinced lives in every person, who fought for human and earth rights with determination, respect and insistence, who never gave up, who spread the gospel by word and deed and died reading the beatitudes to her killers.
The people here, in Brazil, say Dorothy lives forever!
(Dorothy vive! Sempre, sempre, sempre!)
Offered by Sr. Rebeca Spires, SNDdeN