Born and raised in San Juan, Puerto Rico, Sr. Maria Luz says, “My parents awakened in me a desire to help those in need.”  
 
She first answered this call by taking neighborhood children to catechism classes and assisting those who needed special help.  She became a catechist herself at age 12, and says, “I can see that God was preparing me for the call to religious life.
 
Learning that the Mission Helpers were doing similar work, Marie Luz wrote to the Superior and was invited to visit.  She soon knew that this was the Community in which she wanted to spend her life.  
 
Her first mission was in Barcelona, Venezuela, where she worked in a poor parish giving religious instruction, but also helping to teach vocational skills and finding jobs for the parishioners.  She joined the other Mission Helpers as advocates for the people with government agencies and the school system.
 
She moved to Caracas, again working among the people.  Next, she moved to Brooklyn, New York, as associate director of the Spanish Catechetical Office for the Archdiocese; she later went to Baltimore as director of the Hispanic Pastoral Center for the Archdiocese there.
 
In 1998, she joined the Archdiocese of Washington, D.C., serving as coordinator of Hispanic Catechesis for eight years.  From there, she was off to Florida as the national consultant for Catechesis with Hispanics for Harcourt Brace Religion Publishers.
 
Back in Baltimore, Archbishop Edwin F. O’Brien appointed Sister Maria Luz as the Delegate for Religious in 2009.
 
In 2016 she was elected Vice President of the Mission Helpers of the Sacred Heart.
Today she is a resident of Village Crossroads, a Catholic Charity Community, where she is active in community ministry.
 
Sr. Maria Luz holds a bachelor’s degree in Sociology from Loyola University Maryland, a Master’s degree in Theology from St. Mary’s Seminary in Baltimore, and a certificate in Advanced Catechetics from the Catechetical Institute in Colombia, South America.