Sisters Hail Nun’s Courage in El Salvador : Central America: Religious order in Orange lets Elena Jaramillo ‘call the shots’ at refuge for terrorized families. But concern is rising with ‘the extremity of the situation.’

It was a performance to be expected from Sister Elena Jaramillo, the Sisters of St. Joseph said.

The 5-foot-tall, gray-haired nun, struggling to recover from a case of hepatitis, summoned the strength to defy Salvadoran soldiers who last weekend rousted a tiny church and terrorized the families that had taken refuge there.

The nuns would not leave the church, Jaramillo told the soldiers, until the last refugee was safely released. And despite living in a war zone, ministering in a village where there is no running water and no electricity, Jaramillo, 53, refuses to leave El Salvador.

“Of course, we are all anxious about her safety . . . but we have agreed to let her call the shots,” said Sister Katherine Gray, assistant general superior of the Orange-based order that has counted Jaramillo a member for 36 years.

“She knew what she was getting into,” Gray said, “and she knew there was reason to be afraid. But she is really committed to the people there.”

Jaramillo is the only nun from the 283-member order who is working in El Salvador.

“She is wiry, really alive,” Sister Sharon Fritsch, a counselor in the order, said of Jaramillo. “She is such a people person. She can just make people feel really energetic in her presence.”

Fritsch said Jaramillo’s love affair with the people of El Salvador began in 1986 when she first visited the country to help escort residents from San Salvador, the capital, to their rural hometowns.

“She saw the reality of the danger,” Fritsch said. “I went down to visit her last year and experienced something of the same reality. But once you are in contact with these people, there is a goodness, a steadfastness, a communion you experience with them that is stronger than the fear.”

Through a Christian volunteer organization called Salvadoran Human Aid, Research and Education, Jaramillo moved in October, 1987, to a village that is a four-hour bus trip from San Salvador.

On Monday, the nuns of the Sisters of St. Joseph were reluctant to provide a photograph of Jaramillo or even name the village where she works for fear of retribution by soldiers. Church leaders are increasingly the targets of assassinations in El Salvador, as evidenced by last week’s slaying of six Jesuit priests at a university in San Salvador.

“We have been careful about what we would say to call attention to her,” Gray said. “We know that what appears in the papers here gets back to El Salvador.”

In fact, the nuns heard about Jaramillo’s harrowing weekend through a news report and were surprised that she had provided her name and religious order. “That she was willing to take a stand like that says something about the extremity of the situation,” Fritsch said. “She isn’t somebody to walk foolishly into a dangerous situation.”

Fritsch last spoke with Jaramillo on Wednesday, she said, when Jaramillo was fine. The Sisters of St. Joseph wanted to send medicine for Jaramillo’s hepatitis, but she discouraged them from doing so.

“She said: ‘Please do not do anything. I don’t want anything extraordinary being done,’ ” Fritsch said, adding that Jaramillo’s hepatitis is not considered life-threatening at this point.

Jaramillo last visited the United States in July, when she spent a month with the Sisters of St. Joseph. During that time, she spoke of the struggle of the Salvadoran people and her need to stand in solidarity with them, Fritsch said.

The area where Jaramillo lives was devastated by war in 1980, when the parish priest was driven out by fighting, Fritsch said. The battles destroyed or damaged many buildings, including the church. Jaramillo and another nun share one room as living quarters.

Like the rest of the villagers, the nuns cope with food shortages and the lack of utilities. Among the activities coordinated by the nuns are classes for children and sessions in which villagers learn about farming.

“They lead a very austere life,” Fritsch said. “But she expressed a real joy, a real desire to return.”