A Life Spent in Service

If there’s an American religious sister who deserves a biography, it’s Deirdre Byrne, and Leisa Marie Carzon has stepped up to the task. Her Sister, Soldier, Surgeon: The Life and Courage of Sister Deirdre Byrne, M.D. boasts no fewer than 30 endorsements, including by five bishops, nationally known radio talk-show hosts, pro-life leaders, and, literally topping off the list, President Donald Trump. Though this nun, who goes by the name Sr. Dede, was certainly not an unknown, she burst onto the national scene when, dressed in full habit and holding a Rosary, she proclaimed, “I am not just pro-life, I am pro-eternal life,” as she addressed the 2020 Republican National Convention that nominated Trump a second time. She later remarked that the experience altered her life “180 degrees — the four minutes that changed my world.” Carzon describes the life of a remarkable woman in a chronicle that benefits from the author’s personal access to her subject.

Dede was born in 1956 and enjoyed a solid Catholic upbringing within a loving family. From early on, she was sensitive to the needs of others and thus even in childhood geared her life toward service. As a child, she would adopt stray animals and would even invite “stray people” to eat dinner at the family table. She would follow in the footsteps of her father, who was an accomplished surgeon and served in the Air Force Medical Corps. Carzon’s biography spends a great deal of time on Dede’s own military service, a decision she made to offset the cost of her medical studies, and in some ways this part of the book is not for the faint of heart. Indeed, the book starts out with Dede’s horrific story of a casualty of the war in Sudan: a woman, accompanied by her children, who “had half of her face blown off,” one of her legs “sheared off above the knee,” and another foot “completely missing.” As a military surgeon, Dede served on battlefields, at military installations, and in hospitals all over the world, including in Afghanistan, Korea, the Sinai Peninsula, and Haiti. She was exposed to the most horrific casualties of war and poverty, often literally putting people’s shattered bodies back together.

During these many years, while achieving the rank of colonel, she continued to discern a religious vocation and hoped that somehow she could wed her skill as a surgeon with the mission of a religious community. Carzon recounts Dede’s hope to do exactly that with Mother Teresa’s Missionaries of Charity. James Cardinal Hickey, archbishop of Washington, D.C., with whom Dede was very close, offered her an abandoned convent on the city’s south side. But the Missionaries of Charity community regimen was not compatible with work in a medical clinic, and, ultimately, the MCs were not interested in extending their focus to such an apostolate. With that door closed, Dede, at age 44, in the year 2000 began her religious formation with the Little Workers of the Sacred Hearts in D.C.

Sister, Soldier, Surgeon mentions two episodes of personal difficulty for Sr. Dede. She had submitted to the Little Workers a proposal to establish a medical branch, which the order was reviewing. While on a medical mission in Haiti, and in the middle of a surgical procedure, she received word that a religious sister close to Theodore Cardinal McCarrick, the archbishop who succeeded Cardinal Hickey in D.C., had filed a complaint against Dede and had even sent it to the Vatican. The complaint, from a sister in another order, citing Dede’s service to military hospitals, claimed that Dede, who was just short of professing her final vows, was pro-military and thus pro-war — and that such an attitude was inconsistent with the life of a religious sister. As a consequence, and very awkwardly, Dede had to repeat her years of formation with the Little Workers and was thus delayed in professing her final vows until 2011. In addition to the vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience, Sr. Dede added a fourth personal vow to provide “free, loving medical care for the poor and the uninsured throughout the world.”

Another controversy would result in the temporary revocation of Sr. Dede’s medical license. In 2021 the Capitol required all medical professionals to receive the COVID vaccination. Sr. Dede refused, along with many other pro-lifers, as she would not have “anything to do with vaccines that were developed from or tested on fetal cell lines,” which are harvested from victims of abortion. Serving at Sibley Memorial Hospital, and having treated many COVID patients, Sr. Dede submitted a religious exemption that was not honored. It was also not honored at another Catholic-based healthcare system where she offered her services. Aided by the Thomas More Society, Sr. Dede sued the District of Columbia — and under such a threat D.C. relented and accepted her religious exemption. Her license was restored.

Carzon’s biography highlights Sr. Dede’s advocacy for the pro-life cause. Indeed, perhaps the single reason she was willing to accept the invitation to address the 2020 Republican National Convention was to offset the scandal of Fr. James Martin, S.J., and Sr. Simone Campbell having offered prayers at the Democratic National Convention a few days earlier, giving the impression that Catholics need not oppose that party’s advocacy for the legalized killing of the unborn. With a “heavy heart,” Sr. Dede prayed, “Lord, use me in any way you deem fit for advancing the pro-life cause.” Remarkably, only two hours later, she received a call from the White House inviting her to address the RNC. She said she would accept only if she was allowed to speak “about the sanctity of life.” The White House agreed. Her speech was followed by a storm of opposition that accused Sr. Dede of meddling in politics contrary to the vocation of a nun. She responded to the many complaints, coming from all over the world, that she was obligated to tell the truth and that “abortion is not a political issue but a moral one.” Sr. Dede’s other pro-life involvement includes sidewalk counseling at D.C. abortion centers, providing numerous abortion-pill reversals at her Little Workers medical clinic, and showing public support for the pro-lifers on trial for their 2020 rescue at Washington Surgi-Clinic in D.C. (where Cesare Santangelo kills unborn children through the ninth month of gestation).

The second part of Carzon’s book allows the reader to “shadow” Sr. Dede through a “typical” day of convent life and work at the medical clinic. This reviewer has firsthand experience of much of what Carzon describes, as I had the privilege of staying at the convent’s house next door when I attended the trial of the pro-life rescuers. I attended Mass at the convent chapel with Sr. Dede and ate delicious meals in the convent dining room. It was a little odd to read these pages, after having had similar, personal experiences of what Carzon describes.

Sr. Dede is equipped with a personality that is bold and courageous in defense of Church teachings, zealous to speak the truth, and always on-the-ready to help others embrace the faith. Her zeal is tempered by compassion and a great sense of humor. Carzon is enthusiastic about her subject; in fact, she clearly is enthralled by the person of Sr. Dede. The book is studded with praise. For example, Carzon writes, “Sr. Dede’s approachable and welcoming demeanor, paired with her authentic and radical witness to Christ’s love, elicit almost immediate trust and openness from many who meet her. This is precisely what it means to encounter Christ in others.” And again, “From rising to retiring, Sister Dede’s days are spent in service to others.”

The constant praise is not hyperbolic or exaggerated; it is true and deserved. But if there is a weakness in the biography, it is in its lack of mention of doubts, spiritual dryness, personal faults, mistakes in judgment, and so on. Perhaps this is part of writing about a likely living saint before she is dead. Compare this work with the explosive Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light: The Private Writings of the Saint of Calcutta, which reveals Mother Teresa’s 50-year dark night of the soul and does not omit exposing the minor faults of this holy woman. Yes, Carzon does state, “While many speak of Sister’s courage, strength, and virtues, she is the first to admit her own weaknesses.” Certainly, Sr. Dede’s humility could bear the author’s exposing readers to what some of those weaknesses might be.

I began this review by saying, “If there’s an American religious sister who deserves a biography, it’s Deirdre Byrne.” Might it at least be debated that having such a biography endorsed by someone as controversial and polarizing as Donald Trump could mean Carzon’s fine work will not reach beyond an already sympathetic readership? And as for the timing of the book’s release, Carzon, toward the end of her biography, relates, “Recalling my response to Sister when she asked if I could wait until she was dead to pen this book, people of faith worldwide would echo the same: ‘No, Sister. I’m sorry. The day is now far spent.’”

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