The Gospels Being Lived: How Sister Dorothy Stang's Legacy Inspired an Author

This interview was recorded as part of our "Seeds of Inspiration: The Growing Legacy of Sister Dorothy Stang, SNDdeN event on February 10, 2025.

"I remember it well, a snowy Saturday morning, I was reading the paper, and I found this clipping which said that a nun had been murdered in the Amazon. And I looked at it and I thought, who would do that?"

These words from author Michelle Murdock capture the moment that would transform not only her writing but her understanding of what it means to live the gospel. That murdered nun was Sister Dorothy Stang, SNDdeN, and Michelle's journey to tell Dorothy's story would lead her from the comfortable distance of a newspaper clipping to the heart of the Amazon mission where Sister Dorothy gave her life.

Michelle's initial reaction to the news was one of genuine shock and curiosity. "Being a somewhat naive person of the geopolitical situation then," she admits, the idea that someone would murder a nun seemed incomprehensible. But as she read on, she discovered something remarkable: "She was a sister of Notre Dame de Namur who had taught at this college, Trinity, but she had not taught there. I had gone there and had many of her friends who were my professors."

The connection to Trinity College (now Trinity Washington University), where Michelle had graduated, sparked her interest. But what began as research would become something much deeper—a calling that would ultimately lead her to Brazil and to the very room where Sister Dorothy had stayed.

Michelle threw herself into researching Dorothy's story, photocopying letters from Brazil and Arizona, immersing herself in the details of a life lived in service. But as she wrote, she encountered an unexpected obstacle. "I was writing, and I suddenly felt the roadblock. I felt I had to go to Brazil."

This wasn't simply academic curiosity. Michelle felt "the need to be around Dorothy's people and to see what it looked like." That journey to Brazil would prove transformative in ways she couldn't have imagined.

In Brazil, Michelle experienced something profound. She spent nine days with the sisters in Belém, "in the house in which Dorothy had come. When she would come into the city of Belém, she would stay there. And I stayed in the room where she was, had been."

The intimacy of that experience—sleeping where Dorothy had slept, walking where she had walked—provided Michelle with insights that no amount of research could have provided. She witnessed the trial of one of Dorothy's killers, met Sister Rebecca Spires, SNDdeN, and other sisters continuing Dorothy's work, and began to understand the dangerous reality of mission work in the Amazon.

"That was an eye-opener to a woman who thought she knew a lot about life," Michelle reflects. "And here was laid out for me the structure of the mission work and how they worked, but also the conflict that they had to work against and the good works that many of them were doing."

Perhaps the most powerful realization came when Michelle saw the sisters' work firsthand. Sister Jo Anne Depweg, SNDdeN, was working with indigenous peoples, and Sister Rebecca was helping communities escape poverty, continuing exactly what Dorothy had been doing. "So the gospels were being lived," Michelle concluded. "That's what I could see."

This wasn't theoretical Christianity or comfortable charity from a distance. This was the radical love of Christ lived out in perilous circumstances, among people who are poor, in defense of God's creation.

Twenty years after Dorothy's martyrdom, Michelle sees her legacy as more relevant than ever. "Dorothy was such a model of a good Christian. She connected her people by talking the gospel with them. And she never looked down on them." Dorothy served as godmother to countless families, embodying the love and dignity she preached.

But Dorothy's environmental message resonates especially strongly today. She taught settlers sustainable forestry—how to "cut down a few trees to make a place for your house and for your family and a cow if you're lucky enough to have one. But we don't cut down the full forest because we're going to need the forest as we go forward in life."

Michelle draws a direct line from Dorothy's work to Pope Francis's encyclical Laudato Si'. "I feel that after she died, her work kept going on. And when we see that Pope Francis came up with Laudato Si', which had to have been inspired in large part by the work that she did."

Perhaps most importantly, Dorothy's example of standing up to corruption and injustice remains urgently needed. "She worked with her people to understand that and to try to stand up for them. Whenever she had the opportunity, she would go into Belém and get the deeds for the pieces of land that they were rightfully occupying."

For Michelle, Dorothy's legacy is a call to action for all of us: "My hope is that everyone who feels that there's some wrong going on can stand up, can get involved. I think that people should do whatever they can to emulate what Dorothy did, essentially to stand up for people who are being harmed by actions in their town, in their lives, in government."

Michelle's journey, from reading the newspaper on a snowy morning to the Amazon rainforest, reminds us that sometimes the most important stories find us when we're ready to hear them. Her book "A Journey of Courage: The Amazing Story of Sister Dorothy Stang" ensures that Dorothy's witness continues to inspire new generations.

As the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur continue their mission to make known God's goodness, Dorothy's story sowed seeds of inspiration in hearts around the world. Her life and death challenge us to live the gospels as boldly as she did—standing with those who are marginalized, protecting God's creation, and never backing down from the call to justice.

In Michelle's words, Dorothy showed us what it looks like when "the gospels are being lived." The question for each of us is: how will we answer that call in our own time and place?