L
LequteMan
Guest
Three elderly Italian nuns murdered in Burundi were on Thursday (Sept. 11) laid to rest in a Xaverian cemetery in the Democratic Republic of Congo amid heightened calls for action about their death.
Sister Lucia Pulici, 75, Sister Olga Raschietti, 82, and Sister Bernadetta Boggian, 79, of the Xaverian Missionary Sisters of Mary were gruesomely murdered on Sunday in their convent in the Kamenge area of Burundi’s capital, Bujumbura, Huffington Post said.
The nuns were reportedly beaten and killed with a knife. At least one nun was decapitated. There were conflicting reports about whether they had been raped.
The nuns had lived in Burundi for the last seven years, offering health care, spiritual and social support to the local communities. They had served in Africa for more than 50 years, spending most of the time in the DRC.
Thousands attended their requiem Mass on Wednesday in Bujumbura, where church officials called for thorough investigations and the truth about the deaths.
The nuns were buried in Bukavu town in the DRC, where the order has a cemetery. The sisters had wanted to be buried in Africa according to the Xaverian order’s former regional superior, Sister Delia Guadagnini, to mark their love for the continent to the end.
On the same day police said 33-year-old Christian Butoyi Claude, a suspect in their custody confessed, to the killings, saying the convent was built on his family’s land.
“We don’t believe in the police’s version,” Guadagnini, told the Fides news agency. “We do not think this horrible crime was committed by a single person,” she said.
#Italy #Congo #Catholic #Xaverian
Sister Lucia Pulici, 75, Sister Olga Raschietti, 82, and Sister Bernadetta Boggian, 79, of the Xaverian Missionary Sisters of Mary were gruesomely murdered on Sunday in their convent in the Kamenge area of Burundi’s capital, Bujumbura, Huffington Post said.
The nuns were reportedly beaten and killed with a knife. At least one nun was decapitated. There were conflicting reports about whether they had been raped.
The nuns had lived in Burundi for the last seven years, offering health care, spiritual and social support to the local communities. They had served in Africa for more than 50 years, spending most of the time in the DRC.
Thousands attended their requiem Mass on Wednesday in Bujumbura, where church officials called for thorough investigations and the truth about the deaths.
The nuns were buried in Bukavu town in the DRC, where the order has a cemetery. The sisters had wanted to be buried in Africa according to the Xaverian order’s former regional superior, Sister Delia Guadagnini, to mark their love for the continent to the end.
On the same day police said 33-year-old Christian Butoyi Claude, a suspect in their custody confessed, to the killings, saying the convent was built on his family’s land.
“We don’t believe in the police’s version,” Guadagnini, told the Fides news agency. “We do not think this horrible crime was committed by a single person,” she said.
#Italy #Congo #Catholic #Xaverian