A Rural Calling: Sisters Gretchen Shaffer and Kathleen O’Hagan

In 1975, a pastoral letter from Appalachian Catholic bishops calling out powerlessness and exploitation in coal country inspired Sister Gretchen Shaffer and Sister Kathleen O'Hagan to relocate to Mingo County, West Virginia. There, after school consolidation left children in the Big Laurel community with an unworkable bus commute, the two helped found a school that grew into today's Big Laurel Learning Center.

Over five decades the pair have run food pantries, championed workers' rights, protested mountaintop-removal mining, and provided addiction recovery care, earning local awards including the West Virginia Mine War Museum's Mother Jones Hellraiser Award.

Now 89 and 81, Sister Gretchen and Sister Kathy remain fixtures of the community they helped build, described by neighbors and colleagues as educators, protectors, and, memorably, 'the nuns who drive four-wheelers.'

The full dispatch is available from the source below.