Sr Miriam Therese O'Brien:There was little to suggest an indomitable will in the slight figure of Sr Miriam Therese O'Brien, yet anyone who met her during her brief visits to Ireland as she campaigned for support for her community development programmes in Liberia soon realised that neither the competing warlords in that country nor the worried advice of friends, family and officials that she should leave would deflect her from her commitment to the country she had most recently made her home.
She was born Colette O'Brien in Antrim town on April 18th, 1945. She was educated in St Louis Grammar School in Ballymena and entered the Institute of St Louis in Monaghan in 1962, taking the name Miriam Therese. She qualified as a teacher from St Mary's College of Education in Belfast and taught in secondary schools in Castlewellan, Co Down, and in Belfast before to moving to Nigeria in 1974, in what was to be her first of many involvements with Africa.
After two years as a secondary school teacher she got involved with the development of basic Christian communities in Lagos, one of the practical manifestations of the liberation theology that was sweeping Catholic missionary communities in the 1970s.
She was among those who influenced the Sisters of St Louis in adopting a mission statement in 1985 committing them to "stand in solidarity with the poor . . . [ and] become agents of change in transforming unjust structures". Miriam was elected as one of the three-person leadership team for her congregation from 1985-1992.
In 1992 she joined the Jesuit Refugee Service and was appointed its programme director with responsibility for Liberia, Ivory Coast and Guinea. She worked with refugees in Liberia during the civil war and when the refugees returned remained in that country, setting up a local non-governmental organisation called Development Education Network - Liberia.
DENL has since become known for its creative and innovative approaches to development work in difficult conditions, believing that while aid is essential for immediate survival, development work for the future must begin at the same time. It is involved in a number of projects, including training for participation in citizenship through residential workshops around the country, setting up women's education and development programmes and a theatre group.
Miriam saw this as developing democracy from the ground up for a new Liberia. One of her close friends and colleagues in this work, Franklin Saikor, was last year elected to the post-civil war Liberian parliament as a rare Independent parliamentarian, avoiding association with any of the warring factions.
During the civil war she and her colleagues often had to flee from the competing militias to neighbouring Sierra Leone or Ivory Coast, but she always left flight to the very last minute, and always returned. Often transport had to be improvised. Her colleagues recalled how she once had to be bundled into a cart which was pushed up a railway track to escape the fighting.
Miriam was also influential in Ireland, serving a term on the board of Trócaire in the 1990s, where she is credited with making a critical contribution to its modernisation. The work of DENL in turn continues to be supported by Irish agencies.
"She worked tirelessly and to considerable effect," one friend said, adding that she faced her final illness with typical courage, refusing treatment that would have only been palliative and making the decisions about her own care to the very end.
She died on December 14th and is survived by her father Matthew, her brother Matthew and her sisters Bridget and Maureen.
Sr Miriam Therese O'Brien: born April 18th, 1945; died December 14th, 2006.