Sarasota Graveside Service in Memory of Jean Donovan on the Anniversary of her Martyrdom in El Salvador

About a dozen people from the Sarasota area gathered today for a Memorial Vigil at Jean Donovan's gravesite.

Jean was a missionary and martyr for justice who worked with Dorothy Kazel distributing food for the poor and the refugees and carrying out family education programs.
"Two weeks before she was murdered, with the bloodbath already begun, she wrote to a friend in Connecticut: "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 would be so staunch as to favor the reasonable thing in a sea of their tears and helplessness? Not mine, dear friend, not mine." 
The destinies of Maura Clarke, Ita Ford, Dorothy Kazel and Jean Donovan were joined together in just the last months of their lives. Murdered together by National Guardsmen in El Salvador on Decemer 2, 1980, their deaths became martyrdom for a church of the poor in El Salvador and for thousands of Christians in the United States. Their deaths are understood as martyrdom because the women did what Jesus of Nazareth did, and what he told us we should do to show we are disciples in this world- they loved the poor, and laid down their lives for them. In this way, they became friends of Jesus."
All: May they rest in peace, may she rest in peace; may the martyrs reign on high!

Memorial Vigil at gravesite of Jean Donovan on Dec. 2, 2014

Jean Donovan's Gravesite in Sarasota, Florida

(Photos by Jim Martin)