The Cost of Compassion Five Women Who Paid the Ultimate Price

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Foreward by Joyce Rupp

In 1992, five American missionary sisters, members of the Ruma, Illinois, Province of the Adorers of the Blood of Christ, were murdered by soldiers during a Civil War in Liberia, West Africa. 

This is a story about women who promised to dedicate their life to serving others. The women portrayed here, Sisters Barbara Ann Muttra, Shirley Kolmer, Mary Joel Kolmer, Agnes Mueller, and Kathleen McGuire, displayed a unique courage, competence, and commitment in their missionary calling. But they were also funny, joyful, intelligent, stubborn—and, yes, afraid.

You will want to read about these relatively unknown American martyrs…

• To be inspired by ordinary women—some call them “saints”—who were willing to face danger head on rather than run away from it as they were fervently urged and certainly able to do.
• To experience the unique bond that developed among these “Sisters” and between them and the people they served.
• To understand what happened in Liberia during the brutal fourteen-year civil War (1989-2003), one of Africa's bloodiest, during which more than 250,000 Liberians were killed and a million others were displaced into refugee camps.