Almost 25 years ago, my brother David and I stayed at the Catholic Worker house on First Street in NYC, camping in the container garden on its roof and, with our Village-ite sister Joan, joining us to help in the kitchen.
For the greater part of the last decade, the Ithaca, NY Catholic Worker community - out of which the "St. Patrick's Four" action against the second Iraq War grew - were my neighbors and my fellows among the people gathered for the sumptuous community meals at Loaves and Fishes. I remember clearly the first time I ran into Danny Burns at our neighborhood coffee shop and, later, Clare Grady when each came home after being released from prison: my chest fills even now with the realization of the love and gratitude I felt for them, for their willingness to speak and act so powerfully and simply what was in my heart.
For most of my adult life, whenever I moved to a new city, I would look around for a CW, and the idea of living in community and of "doing my work" (I have been a social worker for 20 years) in community would tug at me. Then, I would get distracted and that desire would go underground again . . .
For the greater part of the last decade, the Ithaca, NY Catholic Worker community - out of which the "St. Patrick's Four" action against the second Iraq War grew - were my neighbors and my fellows among the people gathered for the sumptuous community meals at Loaves and Fishes. I remember clearly the first time I ran into Danny Burns at our neighborhood coffee shop and, later, Clare Grady when each came home after being released from prison: my chest fills even now with the realization of the love and gratitude I felt for them, for their willingness to speak and act so powerfully and simply what was in my heart.
For most of my adult life, whenever I moved to a new city, I would look around for a CW, and the idea of living in community and of "doing my work" (I have been a social worker for 20 years) in community would tug at me. Then, I would get distracted and that desire would go underground again . . .
Pictured to the left is Jean and friend Trooper, who is mentioned below.And then, in 2005, in the days immediately after the levees broke in New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina, I travelled to south Louisiana to run a shelter for the Red Cross (I was the social worker at its homeless shelter in Ithaca). A Catholic community, the Cursillo Center in Prairie Ronde, had opened its doors to the Red Cross and, at any given time, 150 to 250 evacuees from New Orleans and St Bernard Parish. I described my experience in this September 16, 2005 e-mail:
I am just now getting to e-mail for the first time since the levees broke in New Orleans. I am in Prairie Ronde, just outside the town of Opelousas, north of Lafayette. Joanne – my co-worker at the Red Cross in Ithaca - and I are co-managing a shelter with a team of men from the Cursillo Center, a Catholic retreat center here.
I know everyone is exhausted, but the anxious, frightened energy is finally dissipating - in our shelter, at least - and families are beginning to look to the future. Many of the older black women from New Orleans have told us that now their babies - their beautiful black children - might survive because the rest of the world may finally pay attention to what it has ignored for so long.
We are awakened each morning to be welcomed by people who are rebuilding community and hope right before our eyes. It is hard to be tired in the middle of that. The experience of working as a team with the Cursillo community has been extraordinary: we meet nightly to review what is working, what is not, and to collectively coordinate and strengthen our work together and with the evacuees. For the last week, we have held our meetings at bonfire, Jupiter and the moon rising above us. And, then, last night, I sat in the dormitory with Trooper (our real mainstay in the partnership between the Red Cross and the Cursillo Center), my hands held tight in the lap of Miss Juanita, an eighty year old blind woman who is living away from New Orleans for the first time in her life. She and Trooper sang 'That Old Rugged Cross' . . .
I am just now getting to e-mail for the first time since the levees broke in New Orleans. I am in Prairie Ronde, just outside the town of Opelousas, north of Lafayette. Joanne – my co-worker at the Red Cross in Ithaca - and I are co-managing a shelter with a team of men from the Cursillo Center, a Catholic retreat center here.
I know everyone is exhausted, but the anxious, frightened energy is finally dissipating - in our shelter, at least - and families are beginning to look to the future. Many of the older black women from New Orleans have told us that now their babies - their beautiful black children - might survive because the rest of the world may finally pay attention to what it has ignored for so long.
We are awakened each morning to be welcomed by people who are rebuilding community and hope right before our eyes. It is hard to be tired in the middle of that. The experience of working as a team with the Cursillo community has been extraordinary: we meet nightly to review what is working, what is not, and to collectively coordinate and strengthen our work together and with the evacuees. For the last week, we have held our meetings at bonfire, Jupiter and the moon rising above us. And, then, last night, I sat in the dormitory with Trooper (our real mainstay in the partnership between the Red Cross and the Cursillo Center), my hands held tight in the lap of Miss Juanita, an eighty year old blind woman who is living away from New Orleans for the first time in her life. She and Trooper sang 'That Old Rugged Cross' . . .
Six years ago at this time, I had just returned to Portland from Romania, having seen a total eclipse of the sun from a rooftop in the very center of Bucharest. That afternoon, I went to Vespers at a small Eastern Orthodox Church (Biserica Stravropoleos) and then to hear Placido Domingo sing in an open air concert in the horrifically beautiful and deeply hated People's Palace, built "by" Ceausescu. I have saved a note from that time: 'Having seen the moon shine on the other side of the world, I cannot be the same'.
Trooper says that 'Hurricane Katrina' means 'healing wind' (how he got there I do not remember). And, this morning, I see: Having been sung to by Ms. Juanita on the other side of tragedy, I am grateful . . . and I am changed forever."
Trooper (he and his family now my dear friends) and I call that experience my first Cursillo: a three week "walk with Christ", rather than the usual three-day "short walk with Christ". And I fell in love with that walk. I went home to Ithaca and, when my dog Rocky died at 14, I packed up and moved to Louisiana, the first step on my way to discerning a life lived in community, a life lived with those simple, challenging and life-losing-and-finding ways I learned after Katrina.
Four years later, I am unspeakably grateful to be here with the Columbus Catholic Worker community, and to be discerning with the Dominican Sisters of Peace, a warm, loving group of Catholic religious women I met while rebuilding houses in St Bernard Parish just weeks before the 4th anniversary of Katrina.
So grateful to be living the life I had glimpsed at the First Street Catholic Worker 25 years ago; the life I fell in love with during those three life-changing weeks with the loving, hopeful people of south Louisiana as they welcomed me, as we worked together, ate together, lived together.
Server and served increasingly indistinguishable. Hospitality offered and received, received and offered. Community.
I am so glad to be "there" again, here, with you all.
Trooper says that 'Hurricane Katrina' means 'healing wind' (how he got there I do not remember). And, this morning, I see: Having been sung to by Ms. Juanita on the other side of tragedy, I am grateful . . . and I am changed forever."
Trooper (he and his family now my dear friends) and I call that experience my first Cursillo: a three week "walk with Christ", rather than the usual three-day "short walk with Christ". And I fell in love with that walk. I went home to Ithaca and, when my dog Rocky died at 14, I packed up and moved to Louisiana, the first step on my way to discerning a life lived in community, a life lived with those simple, challenging and life-losing-and-finding ways I learned after Katrina.
Four years later, I am unspeakably grateful to be here with the Columbus Catholic Worker community, and to be discerning with the Dominican Sisters of Peace, a warm, loving group of Catholic religious women I met while rebuilding houses in St Bernard Parish just weeks before the 4th anniversary of Katrina.
So grateful to be living the life I had glimpsed at the First Street Catholic Worker 25 years ago; the life I fell in love with during those three life-changing weeks with the loving, hopeful people of south Louisiana as they welcomed me, as we worked together, ate together, lived together.
Server and served increasingly indistinguishable. Hospitality offered and received, received and offered. Community.
I am so glad to be "there" again, here, with you all.
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