Peace and Justice Advocate – Sister Sheila Salmon, HM
Sisters of the Humility of Mary
Sister Sheila Salmon, HM, was a dynamic woman religious whose heart and soul were poured out into loving and living life to the full. A nurse, she gave compassionate care to all God’s children including children and adults with AIDS. Whether in Youngstown or Cleveland in Ohio, or Temuco, Chile, the South Bronx, Nairobi, Kenya, or Fellesmere, Florida, where Sister Sheila served was of less significance than how she served.
Because of her strong commitment to justice and peace, in 2007 she was sentenced to 100 days in a Florida penitentiary for trespassing on federal property while protesting at the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation [WHINSEC] formerly the School of the Americas. WHINSEC is a combat training school in which several graduates have been responsible for severe human rights violations including the assassination of six Jesuit priests along with their housekeeper and her daughter in El Salvador in 1989. When standing before the judge in Columbus, Georgia, Sister Sheila stated, “I did it because our community has made a commitment to nonviolence and I thought it was time for me to take a public stance for justice.” Although she died just a few short years after serving her sentence, Sister Sheila’s legacy lives on in the HM Community.
