Nun known as 'Mother Teresa of Pakistan' to receive state funeral
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IMAGE: EPABy Anto AkkaraTHRISSUR, India (CNS) -- Thegovernment of Pakistan will accord a state funeral to Sister Ruth KatharinaMartha Pfau, a German-born member of the Daughters of the Heart of Mary whodevoted her life to eradicating leprosy in Pakistan.Sister Ruth, dubbed theMother Teresa of Pakistan, died Aug. 10 in Karachi. She was 87."Sister Ruth was amodel of total dedication. She inspired and mobilized all sections of societyto join the fight against leprosy, irrespective of creed or ethnic identity,"Archbishop Joseph Coutts of Karachi, president of Pakistan Catholic Bishops'Conference, told Catholic News Service Aug. 11."We are happy that thegovernment is according her a state funeral on Aug. 19," the archbishopsaid, noting it would be at St. Patrick's Cathedral in Karachi.Pakistani Prime Minister ShahidKhaqan Abbasi said Sister Ruth would be remembered "for her courage, herloyalty, her service to the eradication of leprosy, and most of all, herpatriotism.""Pfau may have been...
IMAGE: EPA
By Anto Akkara
THRISSUR, India (CNS) -- The
government of Pakistan will accord a state funeral to Sister Ruth Katharina
Martha Pfau, a German-born member of the Daughters of the Heart of Mary who
devoted her life to eradicating leprosy in Pakistan.
Sister Ruth, dubbed the
Mother Teresa of Pakistan, died Aug. 10 in Karachi. She was 87.
"Sister Ruth was a
model of total dedication. She inspired and mobilized all sections of society
to join the fight against leprosy, irrespective of creed or ethnic identity,"
Archbishop Joseph Coutts of Karachi, president of Pakistan Catholic Bishops'
Conference, told Catholic News Service Aug. 11.
"We are happy that the
government is according her a state funeral on Aug. 19," the archbishop
said, noting it would be at St. Patrick's Cathedral in Karachi.
Pakistani Prime Minister Shahid
Khaqan Abbasi said Sister Ruth would be remembered "for her courage, her
loyalty, her service to the eradication of leprosy, and most of all, her
patriotism."
"Pfau may have been
born in Germany, her heart was always in Pakistan," he said.
Born in Leipzig, Germany, in
1929, she went to France to study medicine and later joined the Society of Daughters
of the Heart of Mary. Archbishop Coutts said she arrived in Karachi in 1960 due
to some visa problems en route to India and was touched by what she saw at the leprosy
colony off Macleod Road in Karachi. She decided to join the work Mexican Sister
Bernice Vargasi had begun three year earlier, Archbishop Coutts said.
In 1962 Sister Ruth founded
the Marie Adelaide Leprosy Centre in Karachi, Pakistan's first hospital
dedicated to treating Hansen's disease, and later set up its branches in all
provinces of Pakistan. She spent the rest of her life in the country and was
granted Pakistani citizenship.
In 1996, the World Health
Organization declared Pakistan one of the first countries in Asia to be free of
Hansen's disease. The Dawn daily reported in 2016 that the number of those under
treatment for leprosy fell to 531 from more than 19,000 in the 1980s.
The Pakistani bishops' National
Commission for Justice and Peace called Sister Ruth a "national hero of
Pakistan." It said her services for humanity "were nothing less than
a pure manifestation of God's divine love."
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