Sr. Irene Clare Duval

Sr. Irene Clare Duval knew she wanted to be a nun since she was 8 years old, but it wasn’t until she was 48 that she joined the Compassionate Franciscan Sisters of the Poor (formerly the Missionaries of the Poor – Sisters). During the four decades in between she served in the U.S. military, went to college, and worked for the New York City police department as a drug chemist.

Once she had finally paid off her college loans, Sr. Irene joined an order and two years later was sent to Haiti — her birthplace — to minister to a desperately poor community in the mountains of southern Haiti. The people of Viloux quite literally had nothing until she came.

Sr. Irene started a school feeding program that provides meals to 121 children, most of whom were going days without food before she arrived. She opened up the local government school to more children by hiring additional teachers and launched a dispensary, doling out medicine and care to families who had nowhere to turn when they got sick. With our help and support from generous Catholics, she has been able to keep these vital programs running.

“People are always coming to me with some need. I’m able to help because of the varied experiences I’ve had,” Sr. Irene said. “I think that was God’s plan, why he had me wait so long to become a nun.”

One thing Sr. Irene has learned over her life is the importance of prayer. She says it is especially helpful when she makes the trip from her home to Viloux each week to minister to the people. She takes the tap-tap — an overcrowded public bus — then walks the last hour-and-a-half through rocky roads winding up the mountains.

“Prayer is my lifeline,” she explained. “Over and over, I’ve seen how powerful prayer is.” Through her strong faith in God and rich life experiences Sr. Irene works diligently to help Haiti’s poor, despite the challenges.

Click here to read more about Sr. Irene and her life-saving work in Viloux, Haiti.

There is an old saying that goes: “Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.” The second part of that saying is the goal of much of the work we do to help the poor here at Cross Catholic.

However, during staff devotions this morning we were reminded of how important the first part is, as well. Our newest projects officer recently returned from Belize. It was his first time visiting the projects we support there, and he was struck by the impact of the elderly feeding programs — those meeting an immediate need rather than supporting development.

“These programs provide palliative care to deal with the effects of poverty. As we minister to the more immediate needs of these people, we are expressing the love of Christ in a very real way,” he explained. “Yes, it is important to teach people how to fish, so to speak, but what about the people who are too old or sick or unable to learn how to fish? Should we just forget about them?”

It is clear from Matthew 18:14 — “Even so it is not the will of your Father which is in heaven, that one of these little ones should perish.” — that every person is important to God.

Giving an elderly woman a daily meal is just as meaningful in God’s eyes as supporting a scholarship or microenterprise program. Both are meeting important needs of the poor and, in the process, exposing them to Christ.

Click here to learn more about what Cross Catholic is doing to meet both the immediate and long-term needs of the poor in Latin America.

Some kids will invent almost any excuse to stay home from school. But 10-year-old Bruce Mwansa has a legitimate reason for his imperfect attendance. In fact, no one would blame him if he didn’t show up at all.

Bruce Mwansa, 10, would not be able to go to school without the help of Cross Catholic.

At home, Bruce’s only parental figure is his blind, elderly grandfather. His grandmother is dead, his father ran off long ago, and his mother has been incapable of taking care of her ten children since she succumbed to mental illness. The house is empty and dilapidated, and the garden has become a dried out field of dirt. They are so poor that they eat only one meal a day, which they get by begging in the streets.

Bruce’s blind grandfather (center) expressed his thanks to Cross Catholic for helping the motivated young boy get the education he desires.

That’s why Bruce misses so much school – his family needs him to beg. But despite the hardships of his home life, he still manages to attend class twice a week, so he can be with his friends and get an education that many others do not have.

In the poorest parts of Zambia, it’s not uncommon for children to opt out of school altogether. But those who do go are there because they want to be, and they are willing to walk several miles each morning to get there, because they know how important an education is to their future.

Unlike Zambia’s public schools, enrollment at Bruce’s school is one hundred percent free and includes all supplies. Cross Catholic provides the small salaries of the teachers, so they don’t have to pass on the cost to the students, who have nothing to give. The school is the children’s only hope of escaping squalor and hunger and achieving better lives.

Nine-year-old Joseph may be blind, but don’t think of him as disabled. Think of him as a child with a special skill that most of us don’t have.

Joseph, who is blind, has learned to identify his classmates by touch and smell.

During a visit this month to the Chizombezi Deafblind Center in Malawi, Cross Catholic staff members watched Joseph place his hands on his classmates’ faces and identify each one of them by touch and smell. It was amazing to see how he compensated for his blindness through the use of his other senses.

Joseph’s occasional mistakes were met with laughter by the other students, but they were laughing with, not at, him. The children have learned to have a sense of humor about the challenges they face because they no longer face them alone. That close companionship is what makes the Deafblind Center a truly special place. Disabled children in Malawi are often isolated, ignored, denied opportunities to thrive, and made to feel ashamed of their condition. But the Deafblind Center is a safe haven where they can make friends, be free to express themselves, and do the kinds of things that other kids do – even singing and dancing!

We learned from the sisters who run the Center that when Joseph first arrived, he was barely functional because he wasn’t getting the care and attention he needed at home, being just one of eleven siblings in a very poor family. But today, Joseph has a smile on his face and joy in his heart.

Click here to learn more about this great Cross Catholic project and how it is impacting the lives of children like Joseph.

Our project officers must travel to incredibly remote places to reach some of the projects we support—but they’re well worth the effort. For instance, Claudio, who covers Latin American projects, describes his recent journey to a boarding school in the mountains of Arequipa, Peru. After a long flight, he rode a crowded bus for 12 hours until it literally reached the end of the road.

A happy student at Home of the Incarnate Word boarding school in the remote mountains of Peru, enjoys a hearty meal sponsored by Cross International Catholic Outreach.

Even though the trip to get there was exhausting, Claudio says Home of the Incarnate Word is one of his most favorite projects to visit. The children there exude the joy of the Lord. Besides, their families live even farther away. The children must walk anywhere from several hours to several days to get home. If it weren’t for this boarding school, they would not have an education, and the chance to better their lives.

Likewise, if it weren’t for an aqueduct construction project deep in the forest of rural Dominican Republic, nearly 900 people would not get the chance to have water. For a long time, they couldn’t find anyone to fund the project because it’s too remote. But Cross Catholic did. So Claudio drives several hours across the country to even get to the region. Then the trip to the water project begins—first by 4WD truck, then by mule, then finally on foot.

The trek is daunting. But just think…women and children must make a similar journey every day, sometimes several times a day, just to fetch water for their families—and even then, it’s not always drinkable. This remote project is worth the trip because it will eventually bring clean, safe water directly to their villages instead.

It can be humiliating to be treated as a charity case—the object of someone else’s pity and justification for their pride. Not being able to feed your family can be enough of a blow to your self esteem; but having food (or a house, or other basic need) provided in the wrong spirit can be almost as crushing.

Poor Filipino families participate in the solution to their housing problem by helping construct the homes provided to them.

That is why Cross International Catholic Outreach takes care to maintain the dignity of the poor. Rather than take a “Santa Claus” approach, we lend behind-the-scenes support to local churches and ministries already serving poor communities. A needy family is helped by their own parish priest, for example. This not only builds up a family’s self worth and sense of community, it builds up the local church as well.

Whenever possible, we also require the poor to be part of their own solution. For instance:

• Side-by-side with local Filipino Catholics, poor families in Manila help build and paint the homes they receive through Gawad Kalinga.
• Villagers in the Dominican Republic dig the trenches to make way for a clean-water aqueduct provided through their diocesan charity, FUNDASEP.
• And families who can are asked to contribute a token 20 cents a month for their child’s education at Mine Hara Catholic School.

As Catholics, we are instructed to treat others—including the very poor—as we would want to be treated (Luke 6:31). More than that, in humility we are to consider them better than ourselves. (Philippians 2:3). It is with such humility that Cross International Catholic Outreach strives to honor the poor by helping them in Jesus’ name, and with his love.

What if Einstein never went to school but made a living running a hot dog stand instead of formulating new ways to ponder creation that earned him the Nobel Prize for Physics? Sound preposterous? Not so much, if he’d lived in Haiti, where a college education is about as attainable as a moonwalk. There, poor, gifted, students are relegated to menial labor, and the world never benefits from their brilliance. The long-term effect of such a travesty is the loss of a potential talented, professional workforce that could turn the tide of Haiti’s floundering economy.

If it weren’t for the full scholarship Cross Catholic provides Lourdwidge through H.E.L.P., Haiti would be robbed of a future physician, and a brilliant student would be relegated to a life of continued poverty.

With support from Cross Catholic, Haiti’s hidden Einsteins are getting ‘H.E.L.P.’:
Full scholarships to Catholic Universities through the Haitian Education & Leadership Program—the equivalent of a moonwalk to students like Lourdwige Felizor.

Lourdwidge is one of four siblings. Her father, a carpenter, and her mother, a housewife, sacrificed to send her to an all-girls Catholic school, where she graduated at the top of her class. She had incredible potential, but her father could not afford to send her on to college. When H.E.L.P. saw her scores they invited her to apply for a scholarship. In her essay application, she writes: “If given a chance, I’d like to improve the medical health situation in Haiti and increase the number of doctors here, by becoming one. Once I become a doctor my dream is to give care to the most in need.”

Today, thanks to a H.E.L.P scholarship provided through Cross Catholic, Loudwidge is in her 5th year of medical school and plans to specialize in endocrinology. For Loudwidge, the moon looks closer every day.

Tuesday I traveled into Kenya’s Great Rift Valley. The trip was long as the roads were typical of what one sees outside most city limits…the last five miles on tracks that picked through the arid landscape. This area has been severely affected by an ongoing drought. Everyone seemed to be pleased that it had been raining for a few days and, of course, everyone hoped that it would continue. I heard someone say that Kenyans ‘eat’ rain…an expression that connects the rain to food production.

I finally arrived in Katale and the following day I checked in on a project we support there, St. John Bosco Rehabilitation Center. The center is operated by the Maryknoll Lay Missioners under the guidance of the Diocese of Kitale. Russ Brine is the project manager…a great guy, extremely organized.

This education program is multi-pronged: The most vulnerable children are housed on campus from Sunday at 3 p.m. through Saturday at 1 p.m. The children have an opportunity to stay connected with their families but not long enough to slide back into negative behavior…sniffing glue for example. A social worker goes to students’ homes to keep parents/guardians informed of their progress. Each student is carefully monitored…They are intentional about the number of students they admit so they can maintain quality monitoring.

A family of the Turkana tribe stands in front of their igloo-like hut made of garbage scraps—the typical home of students at St. John Bosco Rehabilitation Center in Kitale, Kenya.

We visited slums where most of the students live. The children are from Turkana families. They are nomadic pastoralists who have moved to Kitale due to the drought that has parched the area near their homeland around Lake Turkana. Their homes are made by the women from sticks and whatever plastic and cloth can be collected from area garbage dumps, and resemble igloos…they do not keep out rain but do provide a measure of protection from sun and mosquitoes.

Russ has a good understanding of resource management and emphasizes quality over quantity. He is building a national staff that is well trained and very involved in the development of their program—one of the most culturally appropriate programs I’ve seen in Kenya. They have farming and vocational training programs, as well as an additional 20 or so adult women who implement the program in the slum areas. They are eyes and ears for the center’s staff.

I remain impressed by St. John Bosco Rehabilitation Center. They are doing a good work here.

When an Islamic primary school invites a Catholic teacher to speak to its students, you know there’s got to be an incredibly compelling reason.

In Uganda, that reason is AIDS prevention.

Josephine Kabuye teaches Muslim primary school students about the dangers of sexual promiscuity

Recently, a few Cross staff members got to sit in on a classroom session while Josephine Kabuye, an Education For Life facilitator with the Mbikko Integrated Development project, quizzed a group of Muslim students on their knowledge about HIV/AIDS – a disease that has claimed many lives and orphaned many children in this poor African country.

Josephine, whose own brother is infected with HIV, asked the children to tell her what they know about condoms. Ugandan children are exposed to sex and even prostitution at a young age, but have many misconceptions about how to protect themselves. Josephine’s goal is to show them that the only safe choice, and the only moral choice, is sexual abstinence until marriage.

Muslims and Catholics disagree on many things, but both groups see how AIDS has ravaged Uganda, and they are willing to work together to reach children as early as possible with a message of sexual purity. Catholics can’t proselytize in Muslim schools, but they can motivate kids to live moral lives. And it seems to be working.

Thirteen-year-old Joyce, a student at a nearby Catholic school that hosts Education For Life seminars, told us that older youths have offered her money for sex on more than one occasion, and she has said no every time.

“We should not give the gift of sex,” Joyce said, as she explained to us the strategy she learned for keeping herself pure – avoiding bad peer groups, dressing modestly, staying away from bars, and joining sports and social clubs.

Behavior change is also a spiritual matter, and that is why Josephine uses the Old Testament (which is also respected by Muslims) in her discussions. She wants to reach the hearts of the children and convince them that there is more to life than sex. Often, young girls will confide in her that they have been raped by a family member or forced to have an abortion. They need to know that there is hope, that God loves them, and that their value is more than skin deep.

CLICK HERE to find out how you can support the Mbikko Integrated Development project and turn back the tide of the HIV/AIDS pandemic.

Please remember to keep our Kenyan ministry partners and their communities in your prayers. The situation there is truly dire.

A severe drought is sweeping across the eastern African nation, crippling its agriculture-based economy and leaving entire villages without water. The United Nations World Food Program estimates that nearly four million Kenyans are in urgent need of food right now. The water shortage has also intensified local ethnic conflicts as various tribes compete for bits of land that haven’t yet turned to dust.

Poor Kenyan children depend on the support of our donors for education, medical care, and nutrition

The bottom line: people are dying, and relief just isn’t coming in fast enough.

Rain is not expected to return until October. But when the rain comes, it will hit hard, and the Kenyans will have a new problem to worry about – floods – thanks to a forecasted El Nino weather pattern.

Cross Catholic has several ongoing projects in Kenya. One of our commitments is to cover education costs for poor children to attend Catholic schools, such as St. Joseph Freinademetz Primary School in Ruai, about 30 miles from the center of Nairobi. We also provide care for chronically ill patients suffering from HIV/AIDS and tuberculosis, through the Riara Health Project.

The priests, nuns, and other dedicated workers involved in these important outreaches need our prayers to help them through this difficult time. We believe God can take evil circumstances, no matter how bad, and use them for his good purposes. May this crisis become opportunity for the poor to receive Christ’s love!