By Rita McInerney

Dr. Rosalie Bertell, GNSH, founder and director of the International Institute of Concern for Public Health in Toronto, traveled to Stockholm early in December to accept an "Alternative Nobel" award for her work researching the danger of nuclear energy.

Sister Mary Charlotte Barton, superior general from Yardley, PA, represented the Grey Nuns of the Sacred Heart at the award ceremony in the Swedish Parliament honoring Sister Bertell and the three other recipients of the Right Livelihood Awards which were established by Jakob von Uexkull, a Swedish-German baron, to honor individuals and organizations which implement practical solutions a to world problems.

Sister Bertell, who has crusaded against use of nuclear energy, including radioactive fuels and weapons, was recognized for her "vision and work forming and essential contribution to making life more whole, healing our planet and uplifting humanity."

Members of the Grey Nuns working here in Atlanta shared their superior general's pride in the "dedication and accomplishments" of Sister Bertell, who taught math at d'Youville Academy on Chamblee Tucker Road from 1967 to 1969, the year the school closed.

An epidemiologist, Sister Bertell is a native of Buffalo, NY, and a graduate of d'Youville College in that city. She has a master's degree in math and a doctorate in biochemistry from Catholic University.

Before the ceremony in Stockholm on Dec. 8, she joined an international group of people involved in the Great Peace Journey and visited the Soviet Union for three "packed" days.

In a telephone interview with The Georgia Bulletin, she talked about her visit to Russia as a member of the Great Peace Journey. This project was initiated in Sweden and involves over 5,000 women from around the world. Its goal is to have groups travel to every country in the United Nations to ask representatives of the government five questions based on the UN Charter.

The questions deal with: national legislation to guarantee that defense forces are not used for military purposes other than as UN peacekeeping forces; the barring of development, possession, storage and use of mass destruction weapons, including nuclear weapons; barring the selling of military equipment and weapons technology; cooperation in distribution of the earth's resources so that fundamental necessities of human life -- clean water, food, elementary health care and schooling -- are available to all the world's people; and the settling of conflicts by peaceful means as specified in Article 33 of the Charter.

In Moscow these questions were put to Vadim Zagladin, secretary of the Commission on International Affairs of the Supreme Soviet Central Committee, who spoke for Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev. The Soviet Union said "yes" to all the questions, Sister Bertell said, and the group received a copy of the questions and answers signed by Gorbachev.

She called the two-hour session "generally encouraging."

"I don't think I'm naive," she said. "We asked hard questions," including queries about Afghanistan and Chernobyl. About Russian military aggression in Afghanistan, Zagladin said his nation was in the process of withdrawing troops from that rugged land. Zagladin replied to a question on the Chernobyl nuclear disaster by saying that it is the intent of the Russians to phase out nuclear fission as soon as possible, but did not put a date on when that would be, Sister Bertell said.

Sister Bertell said 83 nations, representing 3.46 billion people, have said "yes" to all five questions. The U.S., she said, answered two questions in the affirmative, that asking steps to bar development, possession, storage and use of mass destruction weapons, including nuclear weapons, and the one asking for cooperation in distribution of the earth's resources to all the world's people.

United States officials meeting with a delegation from the Great Peace Journey in Washington on Dec. 5 were John Gunderson, division chairman, international security policy, State Department, and Donald Lowitz, ambassador for disarmament in Geneva.

Sister Bertell came away from Russia with the impression that the Russian Orthodox Church is "alive and well." One of the places she visited was the Seminary of the Holy Trinity in Zagorsk. Here the group was told there are 1,400 seminarians enrolled, double the number of 10 years ago.

At a Saturday morning Mass in Moscow there were about 1,000 worshippers, of mixed ages, she estimated, including the expected little old ladies in babushkas, young people and children. All churches, the group was told, are classified as "museums," with those in use referred to as "living museums."

There are "political penalties" for being overly religious, they learned. Professing faith is not considered a political plus and anyone doing so can not expect to go too far in the party system of that Communist superpower.

Sister Bertell was a cancer researcher at an institute in Buffalo in the 1970s but left that work when criticism from the nuclear industry dried up her grant funds. She started the non-profit institute monitoring public health concerns in 1984.

She is critical of the United States for continuing to test nuclear bombs at the Nevada test site. "They're junking it," she said of this country in regard to the Salt II treaty's moratorium on testing. "There's no excuse now of verification" since, she said, the Soviet Union has allowed placement of instruments to verify detonation in that country. The Soviets, she said, seem to be satisfied to monitor U.S. testing activity from Mexico.

With the Right Livelihood Award, Sister Bertell received a cash award of $25,000. She hopes to use some of this money, she said, to assist the Cherokees in Oklahoma in their effort to halt an experimental program by the Kerr McGee plant in Gore, OK. The program involves spreading waste from the plant's manufacture of armor piercing bullets made from uranium and uranium fuel rods over farmland.

She said the plant chemists add ammonia to the waste. This produces a slight amount of nitrate, one of the components of a fertilizer, in an attempt to justify the program.

"They've been doing it for five years," she said, "over the lush, beautiful farmland of eastern Oklahoma. People say they're just dumping. It's a farce to call it fertilizing."

Many local people, she said, have been getting sick. The plant then buys up their land. Kerr McGee plans to extend the program to 7,000 - 8,000 acres after starting with 300 acres. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission permits them to spread it on their own land, Sister Bertell said.

The Cherokees, she continued, have been collecting data to determine how the health of people is being affected both downwind and upwind of the plant and the land they are using. It would take about $20,000 to computerize this data, she said. This is her business, "working with victims. They don't have the money," she said.

Sister Betty Donohue, a Grey Nun of the Sacred Hart at the Cathedral of Christ the King, remembers Sister Bertell from the d'Youville Academy days as quiet and unassuming. "We used to kid her about her mind going all night long." She was especially interested in anything concerning the nuclear issue, Sister Donohue added.

Always evident, the local nun stresses, both where Sister Bertell was stationed here and in later meetings, is "her strong spirit of spirituality."

Named recipients of the 1986 prizes, along with Sister Bertell, were Helena Norbert-Hodge, a Swedish linguist working in the Himalayan region of India; Everisto Nugkuag, an Indian from the Peruvian rain forest striving to protect the culture of the Amazon basin; and Dr. Alice Steward, a British physician who proved that fetal X-rays can cause childhood cancer.