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Sister Dorothy Stang devoted her life to helping others and realized this what she wanted to when she was 16 when she entered the Sisters of Notre Dame. She wanted to help people in need, but she realized that she wanted to preserve the Amazon rainforest in Brazil, as the biodiversity of the forest as well as of the planet was, and still is, at stake. Sister Stang seems to have felt more a steward of the rainforest rather than developing a kinship with the people who lived there.

Dorothy Mae Stang was born in June 7, 1931. Her parents were Brazilian, but they lived in Ohio. She was one of 9 children and her father was in the U.S. army and her mother was a housewife. They were devout Catholics, and raised their daughter as such. Dorothy Stang grew up on the family farm, and when she turned 16, she joined the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur. Notre de Namur University, which was known as the College of Notre Dame back then, was where Dorothy Stang became Sister Mary Joachim. She went on to become an elementary school teacher after graduating from college.

She became involved in Brazil starting in 1966 and realized from that point on that she wanted to do everything she could to preserve it. The rainforest was, and still is, under attack. 20% of the Amazon has been lost, and by 2030, 27% of the rainforest wouldn’t even have trees anymore. Deforestation has been a major environmental issue in the past 2 centuries, but in the Amazon deforestation affects the climate, the biodiversity, and the people living there. Sister Dorothy Stang sacrificed herself for the forest and its people. She knew the importance of the environment and had seen the hardships of the people living in the forest. Her fight, though noble, could be seen as a form of stewardship.

In Brazil, she stayed faithful to the gospel and word of God though founding several parishes and the creation of 23 schools. She had many talents, including learning and understanding the native language and understanding various issues that affected the local population. The main issue that she was concerned with was the destruction of the land that was, and still is, going on through deforestation. But, she also spread the word of God by creating a sense of community in the rural areas and taught them the gospel. She did everything she could to help the poor, from feeding them to assisting any way that she could.  Sister Stang did a lot for the poor, and can see why she could be considered a saint one day.

Her work was inherently dangerous as there is at least one known attempt on her life where she narrowly escaped. She was one to fight for the little guy, as she fought against illegal logging and confronted ranchers who were not doing their duty to protect the rainforest. The ranchers were using their ability to exploit the poor and payoff the police at an alarming rate, thus allowing them to do whatever they wanted and typically meant enriching themselves at the expense of others. This included the suppression of ideas that Stang was attempting to spread, and due to using the police to their advantage, had here arrested. She was passing out pamphlets with the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which goes to show the forces that she was up against. But, she would not stop her mission as she was determined to influence others to change their ways.

Sister Stang was a determined individual that did her due diligence in order to be able to fight back the forced she was up against on a level playing field. What we mean by this is that emphasized in having faith in God but also realized that it wasn’t enough. She needed to be able to fight back and she did by studying the laws and seeing how farmers were being taken advantage of. A prime example of this was that the poor farmers were promised land but the ranchers were not allowing them to have. Instead, the land was given to the loggers so that further destruction of the rainforest could continue, all in the name of profits in the short term without even thinking of the long term repercussions. She set up many programs and they would tear them down, but she always had a positive attitude and was smiling as she knew in her heart that it was the right thing to do.

But now we ask, why do we care after all these years about the impact that she may or may not have had trying to educate people about the dangerous game that they were playing with the rainforest? Is it because she is associated with the NDNU (formerly College of Notre Dame) and we see her name on the Stang Center on the chapel? Maybe we care because the rainforest acts as the lungs of the world, transforming the carbon dioxide we breathe out into the oxygen that we need to survive. It could also be that we didn’t know who she was or what she stood for, as it appeared to be just another name on the wall. But knowing more about her has allowed us to understand who she really was, a steward of the rainforest who wanted to change minds and influence the people in power to change their ways. But as we know, the deforestation is still going on and is still a very dangerous to oppose it as there are numerous instances of harassment and forced evictions. Many of these incidents go unnoticed and unpunished, which is  unfortunate, as trying to find common ground is difficult but is nearly impossible when one side is relentless.

Sister Stang, as we have mentioned, was a steward of the rainforest as was looking out for and attempting to manage it. He understood what it meant to fight for a just cause, as one of the shirts that she would regularly wear stated “the death of the rainforest is the end of our lives.”Stang embodied this after she had attended the first Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro and realized how bad a shape the planet was in. Her vision was to allow all parts of life to live together, peacefully and not have the exploitation go on. She envisioned a world where needs were met and wants were kept to a minimum as those are what creates the issue of not caring what happens and exploiting what you can for personal gain. But another part of her rational was why we as humans get to enjoy the planet and animals don’t, especially when we cut down their homes.

The sudden and abrupt end to her life was very gruesome and very sudden as she was shot at point blank by two ranchers. But her resolve to stand by what she believed in, even in the face of death, is commendable. When asked by one of the ranchers if she had any weapons, she said the bible was the only weapon that she needed and began reading a passage from Beatitudes. The situation in the Amazon got very tense after this, as the government sent in federal troops to try and control the situation that had been developing for some time and culminating in Sister Stangs execution. She was revered in the community as nearly 2,000 people attended her funeral as they recognized the efforts that she put forth. Near the end of her life, she seemed to know that she did not have much time left as the situation was becoming more and more dangerous, and is evident as later t bounty was placed out for her death. The community claimed to be planting her, instead of burying her, and her home and surrounding area in the Amazon was designated as federal land. Sister Stang was fearless and relentless in her attempt to change the status quo and improve the lives of the least fortunate. Her legacy is one that we should admire and live up to, although it would be quite difficult as she sacrificed everything in order to try and achieve her dream.