Dorothy Kazel (June 30, 1939 – December 2, 1980), was an American Ursuline

religious sister A religious sister (abbreviated ''Sr.'' or Sist.) in the Catholic Church is a woman who has taken public vows in a religious institute dedicated to apostolic works, as distinguished from a nun who lives a cloistered monastic life dedicated to pra ...

and

missionary A missionary is a member of a religious group which is sent into an area in order to promote its faith or provide services to people, such as education, literacy, social justice, health care, and economic development.Thomas Hale 'On Being a Mi ...

El Salvador El Salvador (; , meaning " The Saviour"), officially the Republic of El Salvador ( es, República de El Salvador), is a country in Central America. It is bordered on the northeast by Honduras, on the northwest by Guatemala, and on the south by ...

. On December 2, 1980, she was beaten, raped, and murdered along with three fellow missionaries –

Maryknoll Maryknoll is a name shared by a number of related Catholic organizations, including the Maryknoll Fathers and Brothers (also known as the Catholic Foreign Mission Society of America or the Maryknoll Society), the Maryknoll Sisters, and the Mary ...

Sisters Ita Ford,

Maura Clarke Maura Clarke (January 13, 1931 – December 2, 1980), was an American Catholic Maryknoll sister who served as a missionary in Nicaragua and El Salvador. She worked with the poor and refugees in Central America from 1959 until her murder in 1980. ...

and laywoman

Jean Donovan Jean Marie Donovan (April 10, 1953 – December 2, 1980) was an American lay missionary who was beaten, raped, and murdered along with three fellow missionaries— Ita Ford, Maura Clarke and Dorothy Kazel—by members of the military of El Salv ...

– by members of the

military of El Salvador The Armed Forces of El Salvador ( es, Fuerza Armada de El Salvador) are the official governmental military forces of El Salvador. The Forces have three branches: the Salvadoran Army, the Salvadoran Air Force and the Navy of El Salvador. Histor ...

Life and work

Kazel was born Dorthea Lu Kazel to

Lithuanian American Lithuanian Americans refers to American citizens and residents who are Lithuanian and were born in Lithuania, or are of Lithuanian descent. New Philadelphia, Pennsylvania has the largest percentage of Lithuanian Americans (20.8%) in the Unit ...

parents, Joseph and Malvina Kazel, in Cleveland,

Ohio Ohio () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Of the fifty U.S. states, it is the 34th-largest by area, and with a population of nearly 11.8 million, is the seventh-most populous and tenth-most densely populated. The sta ...

. When she joined the Ursulines, a Roman Catholic religious institute in 1960, she took the name Sister Laurentine, in honor of an Ursuline

nun A nun is a woman who vows to dedicate her life to religious service, typically living under vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience in the enclosure of a monastery or convent.''The Oxford English Dictionary'', vol. X, page 599. The term is o ...

martyred during the

French Revolution The French Revolution ( ) was a period of radical political and societal change in France that began with the Estates General of 1789 and ended with the formation of the French Consulate in November 1799. Many of its ideas are consider ...

. As the Catholic Church modernized during the 1960s, she became known as Sister Dorothy. In the

Central America Central America ( es, América Central or ) is a subregion of the Americas. Its boundaries are defined as bordering the United States to the north, Colombia to the south, the Caribbean Sea to the east, and the Pacific Ocean to the west. C ...

n community where she died, she was known as Madre Dorthea (Dorothy).Sister Dorothy Kazel, Martyred in El Salvador by Sr. Kathleen Cooney (1999), website maintained by Kazel's motherhouse, accessed online December 8, 2006
Kazel completed her bachelor's degree and

novitiate The novitiate, also called the noviciate, is the period of training and preparation that a Christian ''novice'' (or ''prospective'') monastic, apostolic, or member of a religious order undergoes prior to taking vows in order to discern whether t ...

between 1960 and 1965. Beginning in 1965, she taught for seven years in Cleveland, and did missionary work among the Papago Tribe of Arizona. After finishing a

master's degree A master's degree (from Latin ) is an academic degree awarded by universities or colleges upon completion of a course of study demonstrating mastery or a high-order overview of a specific field of study or area of professional practice.

counseling Counseling is the professional guidance of the individual by utilizing psychological methods especially in collecting case history data, using various techniques of the personal interview, and testing interests and aptitudes. This is a list of co ...

in 1974, Kazel decided to partake in the challenge of joining the Diocese of Cleveland's mission team working in El Salvador. Once there, Kazel worked in the Church of the Immaculate Conception in La Libertad, training

catechists Catechesis (; from Greek: , "instruction by word of mouth", generally "instruction") is basic Christian religious education of children and adults, often from a catechism book. It started as education of converts to Christianity, but as the re ...

, carrying out sacramental preparation programs, and overseeing the distribution of

Catholic Relief Services Catholic Relief Services (CRS) is the international humanitarian agency of the Catholic community in the United States. Founded in 1943 by the Bishops of the United States, the agency provides assistance to 130 million people in more than 110 ...

aid and food supplies. She was also engaged in working with

refugee A refugee, conventionally speaking, is a displaced person who has crossed national borders and who cannot or is unwilling to return home due to well-founded fear of persecution.

s from the

Salvadoran Civil War The Salvadoran Civil War ( es, guerra civil de El Salvador) was a twelve year period of civil war in El Salvador that was fought between the government of El Salvador and the Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front (FMLN), a coalition or " ...

, obtaining food, shelter, and medical supplies, and transporting the sick and injured to medical facilities.

Murder

Legacy

*There is a section of the

Ursuline High School, Wimbledon The Ursuline High School, Wimbledon (“the Ursuline”) is a voluntary-aided, Roman Catholic Secondary School for girls aged 11 to 19. The school is based at Crescent Road and the Downs, Wimbledon, London. It was founded in 1892 by the Ursulin ...

in England campus named after Dorothy; it is widely known within the school as the DK block. That particular block is used for business studies and is fairly new, only built a few years ago. It contains many computers and new technology, and acts as the finance office of the school. *There is a home that houses members of the Jesuit Volunteer Corps in South Central Los Angeles named in Dorothy's honor. Members of the program work as full-time volunteers at non-profit organizations such as My Friends Place, The Center at The Blessed Sacrament, Homeboy Industries, and Carecen. *

Ursuline College Ursuline College is a private Roman Catholic liberal arts college in Pepper Pike, Ohio. It was founded in 1871 by the Ursuline Sisters of Cleveland and was one of the oldest institutions of higher education for women in the United States and ...

in Cleveland, Ohio maintains an award known as the Dorothy Kazel Award that honors students who showcase service and honesty. The college also has a volunteer organization known as the Sister Dorothy Kazel Club for Systemic Change which participates in annual protests with SOA watch and education on social justice.

References

External links

Justice & The Generals: U.S. Law – Trial History
supporting material for documentary first aired on Public Broadcasting Service, PBS. Accessed October 7, 2005.
Martyrdom in El Salvador
on Maryknoll Sisters website. Accessed October 7, 2005.

Memorial program in El Salvador in honor of the four churchwomen, accessed online December 8, 2006.

(1993) accessed online December 9, 2006. {{DEFAULTSORT:Kazel, Dorothy 1939 births 1980 deaths American people of Lithuanian descent People from Cleveland 20th-century American Roman Catholic nuns Assassinated American activists Catholic martyrs of El Salvador Roman Catholic missionaries in El Salvador American Roman Catholic missionaries Ursulines Female Roman Catholic missionaries American people murdered abroad People murdered in El Salvador People of the Salvadoran Civil War 20th-century Roman Catholic martyrs Deaths by firearm in El Salvador Burials in Ohio 1980 murders of U.S. missionaries in El Salvador American expatriates in El Salvador Catholics from Ohio

Life and work

Murder

Legacy

References

Further reading

External links