Sr. Ortiz: Torture victim to peacemaker
Sr. Ortiz: Torture victim to peacemaker By
Dennis Sadowski, Catholic News Service
February 26, 2021
CLEVELAND -- Ursuline Sr. Dianna Ortiz was teaching Indigenous children as a missionary in Guatemala in 1989 when her ministry was torn apart in the midst of the country’s brutal civil war.
Guatemalan soldiers abducted her from a garden Nov. 2, detaining her for 30 hours. She reported being gang raped and tortured repeatedly until she escaped.
Returning to the United States, Sr. Ortiz became a human rights advocate and peacemaker, starting an organization for torture survivors and becoming a visible presence of nonviolence at vigils and marches in the nation’s capital.