East Timor

In the lead-up to the vote on the issue of autonomy for East Timor in 1999, an Australian Sister of Charity went there with a team from Caritas Australia. She was a first hand witness to the oppression, manipulation and straight out fear tactics imposed by the Indonesian military on a people who had suffered since the invasion of their country in 1975. Returning to work there in early 2000, she contributed significantly to the setting up of local health clinics in the mountain areas outside Dili. Treatments, dressings, staff training for development and for basic nursing skills were part of her work in a country still far from stable and tragically under-resourced.

Sadly, in 2003, the Sisters of Charity the sister involved was forced to return to Australia with a serious illness. Her subsequent untimely death meant the closure of much of this wonderful ministry but her memory lingers on in the hearts and minds of the East Timorese people.
In the mind of our Foundress the Sisters were to be "women of head and heart and hands", willing to live on the edge as they discerned needs and were moved to respond. The increasing diversity in ministry of the Sisters working beyond Australia's shores matches the growing diversity on the home front. It bespeaks a willingness to experience the heartache of injustice and to reveal that pain to those who are able to redress the evil. With a great deal of humour as well as deep compassion, Sisters wrote back to the Sisters in Australia from far-flung outposts, their letters providing a dynamic and moving record of this aspect of mission. May God's loving protection continue to be with our Sisters who live out their vision in remote places.