By Rita McInerney

Sister Sponsa has returned to her mission children forced to flee the civil war in Cape Palmas, Liberia last summer.

The 28 children were taken to safety in neighboring Ivory Coast by Sister Sponsa who then reluctantly agreed to doctor’s advice to seek treatment in the U.S. for an ankle broken in a fall. She returned to this country in late summer determined to return as soon as possible to Our Lady of Fatima Rehab Center and the boys and girls she cares for there. All of them suffer from polio or birth defects.

At that time it was becoming too dangerous for the mission inhabitants to remain. The rebels were closing in on the center.

In the fax message she sent Beltran family members Feb. 5, she reported that “My children are super,” and that she expected to return to Liberia after having some of their braces replaced or adjusted in Abidjan, Ivory Coast.

In correspondence Jan. 22, before she left the U.S., Sister Sponsa said that while “the situation in Liberia is not yet as stable as we would want, nonetheless it is fairly safe to live there provided we can get a good supply of food.”

In that letter she expressed thanks to all the people in the archdiocese who continue to help the Liberian people through her. She asked continued prayers for her work with the children and the poor, and that God give the Liberian people “the courage they need to begin life anew in their further impoverished land.”

She was able to take back many “essential” items for the rehab center through the generosity of her benefactors.

A Bernardine sister, Sister Sponsa first went to Liberia in 1970 and had to leave in 1977 because of an eye ailment. She returned in 1986.