From Philly

I'm remembering now why I love coming here.

I'm staying in one of the houses owned by the St. Francis Inn called Jean Donovan house. As you walk in through the narrow front door of this row house, the first sight is this drawing of lay worker Jean Donovan and the three Maryknoll nuns who were martyred with her in December of 1980.

During the Salvadoran civil war, they provided shelter, transport, food and buried those killed by the military death squads. Jean went to Bishop Romero's cathedral to hear him preach, and later to his funeral, eight months before her own death. She was engaged to a young physician, Douglas Cable, and felt a strong call to motherhood as well as her call to do mission work: "...I sit there and talk to God and say 'Why are you doing this to me? Why can't I just be your little suburban housewife?' He hasn't answered yet."

Weeks before being beaten, raped and killed by a government death squad, she wrote to her friend, “The Peace Corps left today and my heart sank low. The danger is extreme and they were right to leave... Now I must assess my own position, because I am not up for suicide. Several times I have decided to leave El Salvador. I almost could, except for the children, the poor, bruised victims of this insanity. Who would care for them? Whose heart could be so staunch as to favor the reasonable thing in a sea of their tears and loneliness? Not mine, dear friend, not mine.”

I love that the very building I'm sleeping in is a chilly, creaking old hymn to the love of God as expressed in the life of one of his servants. I love that sacrifice is part of the culture here. I love the friars, lay workers, sisters, priests and volunteers that live here for sharing these jewels of the faith with me. I love you, my people, so you'll forgive me if I can't help but share them with you.