Nun given 14 years for murder of Sister

FROM JEREMY MCDERMOTT IN BOGOTA
A COLOMBIAN nun has been sentenced to 14 years in prison for the brutal murder of another Sister of her convent, whose body was found dismembered and burnt, with shots to the head.
It took the authorities five months to identify the body of Sr Luz Amparo Granada of the Convent of the Adoration in the historic heart of Bogota.
By the time the investigators got round to examining the nun's room, the presumed scene of the murder, the walls had been repainted and the floors scrubbed with detergent by another nun, Sr Leticia Lopez, who occupied the next room.
The evidence against Sr Leticia began to mount up as cardboard similar to that draped over Sr Luz Amparo's corpse, found in a layby on a main highway out of the capital in November 1999, was found in her room.
Investigators believe that Sr Leticia did not act alone, and that perhaps other nuns in the convent were involved.
But since Sr Leticia has maintained her innocence, there has been no talk of accomplices. "DEAR Brothers and Sisters, the whole of Sacred Scripture, especially in its hymns and prayers, bears witness to a great unending dialogue between God and humanity.
"Today's Canticle is taken from the Book of Sirach, which is sometimes called Ecclesiasticus, or the Book of the Church, because it is not part of the Hebrew canon.
"The Canticle is a prayer in time of suffering, begging God to defend the victims against their persecutors.
'This cry is based upon the belief that God is not indifferent in the battle against evil, and that if he strikes the evildoers, it is not to destroy but to bring them to conversion.
"The Canticle implores God to have compassion on his holy people, so that once again the divine glory may shine forth in their midst before all the nations. Because of its firm sense of what God has done in the past and what he plans for the future, the Canticle of Sirach becomes a hymn of hope which the Church can make her own in every age."