As 2007 comes to a close, Bishop Robert N. Lynch will complete his term as chairman of the board of Catholic Relief Services. Bishop Lynch first served on the CRS board from 1989 to 1995, when he was the General Secretary of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. He rejoined CRS leadership when he assumed the board chairmanship in 2002.

Bishop Lynch delivered the following address to the Fall Meeting of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops earlier this week in Baltimore.

Bishop Skylstad,

Bishop Lynch gives an interview amid tsunami destruction in Banda Aceh, Indonesia. Photo by Karl Grobl for CRS

I wish publicly to express to you, as I did three years ago to Archbishop Gregory, my profound thanks for the great privilege of serving as President and Chairman of the Board of CRS. Counting the six years I served this conference as general secretary, I have had the wonderful opportunity to participate as a member of the CRS board for a total of 12 years. In that space of time, the organization has grown from an effective but relatively modest disaster relief agency with an annual budget of less than $100 million to a current program of some $600 million a year focusing on development, health and disaster relief. At the end of next year, we will have spent the more than $175 million entrusted to us by American Catholics and others for the 2005 tsunami relief and returned over 5,000 families to new homes, better able to withstand the fairly regular onslaught of earthquakes. We have built replacement hospitals, businesses and schools in Indonesia, Sri Lanka and India.

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The thoughts and prayers of Catholic Relief Services are with the people of Southern California in the wake of the devastating and frightening fires that swept through their communities. We wish to extend our deepest sympathy to those who endured losses of loved ones, neighbors, property or pets in this disaster.

May God bless you all and may your recovery be swift and thorough.

Ken Hackett
President

A Prayer in Time of Disaster

God our Father,
You set the earth on its foundation
and all elements of nature obey your command.
Help us in our time of trouble;
restore us from our loss from the widespread fire
and turn our fear of your power
into praise of your goodness.
Amen

For those who would like to contribute, Catholic Charities USA is collecting donations to support local agencies’ recovery efforts from the Southern California wildfires.
To contribute:

Call (800) 919-9338

Donate Online

Send checks to:
Catholic Charities USA
Southern California Wildfires 2007
PO Box 7068, Merrifield, VA 22116-7068
Catholic Charities USA is unable to accept contributions of food, clothing, blankets and other relief supplies. Its federal ID number is 53-0196620.

Compassion is his career: Provash Budden brings help to disaster-stricken areas of world

By Cliff Newell
The Lake Oswego Review, Oct 4, 2007

When Provash Budden comes home to visit in Lake Oswego he likes to catch up with family and friends, indulge in a few fine microbrews, ski, raft, and ride his bike.

Provash Budden. Photo by CRS staff

In short, enjoy Oregon in the summertime.

Then he goes back to saving the world. Or at least as much as he can.

When something goes wrong in the world – war, tsunami, earthquake – Budden, as a project officer for Catholic Relief Services, makes it his business to show up and make things better – overseeing the construction of new homes, water systems, health programs, and restoring community businesses.

“It’s pretty engaging and challenging,” said Budden, whose parents still live in Lake Oswego.

“There are a lot of challenges, excitement and good fun. Most of all I get to help people suffering from natural disasters.”

Budden’s most recent mercy excursion was to Meulaboh, Aceh on the west coast of the island of Sumatra, site of the worst devastation of the massive tsunami of December 2004, which killed more than 200,000 people.

As director of the CRS program at Meulaboh, Budden had all of the challenges he could possibly want in a massive reconstruction effort that included rebuilding 100,000 homes.

Read the rest of the story.

Shale Stiller, president of the Weinberg Foundation, which owns the building housing the CRS World Headquarters, speaks during the dedication ceremony. Photos by Jim Stipe/CRS.

Religious leaders, civic dignitaries, representatives of the business community and friends of CRS gathered Wednesday to officially dedicate the new CRS World Headquarters in Baltimore.

CRS President Ken Hackett welcomed Cardinal William Keeler, Baltimore Mayor Sheila Dixon, Rep. John Sarbanes and more than 50 other guests. He spoke about how this new home for CRS will promote interaction between staff that is so critical in carrying out our mission — which presented an interesting design challenge.

This challenge meant we had to create an environment where teams of people instantly interact with one another in new ways. When a hurricane hits Honduras, we swing into action. Our folks here in Baltimore — our finance department, our operations department, our security unit, our media unit, our purchasing folks, our U.S. Operations people, our fundraising people — they all have to provide immediate support to our Emergency Unit and our programs in the field overseas. Each episode is an exercise in teamwork that would make the Super Bowl champions jealous of the timing, precision and dedication to assignments.

After remarks from the dignitaries, Cardinal Keeler blessed the building. Guests were led on tours, which included the chapel, the open office environment, and a state-of-the-art “situation room” where CRS staff in Baltimore can be connected with our people in the field — anywhere in the world.

The dedication received some media coverage, including WJZ-TV and the front page of the Baltimore Examiner.

Here are some additional photos of the event.

Baltimore Mayor Sheila Dixon attended the dedication ceremony on the day after her primary election victory. She praised the work of CRS and commended us for relocating in the key Westside redevelopment area.

After some brief remarks, Cardinal William Keeler blessed the building — and the guests — with holy water.

CRS staff viewed the dedication ceremony from the atrium stairwell and from the upper floors of the building.

Bishop Curtis J. Guillory SVD of Beaumont, Texas celebrates Mass at the Missionaries of Charity chapel in Monrovia, Liberia.

Most Rev. Curtis J. Guillory SVD, Bishop of Beaumont, Texas, who is on Catholic Relief Service’s Board of Directors, recently visited Liberia. Earlier, he blogged about his meeting with former child soldiers. Here, he shares some final impressions of his trip:

One stop on Bishop Guillory’s itinerary was a village where CRS has been active rebuilding infrastructure. He remembers the village chief telling him that CRS “did not overlook them,” that they built a school in the village.

“He said, ‘Some NGOs come all around us, but never stop,’ ” says Bishop Guillory. “CRS never left during the war. CRS continued to bring food and medicine at great risk.”

In Gbanga, a town ravaged by the war, Bishop Guillory talked to Bishop Lewis Jerome Zeigler about the Liberian Catholic Church’s role during the war and its biggest proponent of peace: Archbishop Michael Kpakala Francis. Archbishop Francis became internationally know for his stand against the injustices of the war, condemning those who perpetrated them. He wrote in detail about human-rights abuses and accused the ruling party of a perpetuating a political climate of “arrogance and impunity.”

In more than 50 pastoral letters and numerous meetings with high-ranking international officials, Archbishop Francis drew attention to the war. Forced at gunpoint to flee in 1996, Archbishop Francis continued his quest to call attention to the war. Described by President Johnson Sirleaf as the “conscience of Liberia,” Archbishop Francis is credited by many as helping to bring the war to an end.

Bishop Guillory was impressed with his work and the peace that it spurred. This peace continues today with President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, the first democratically elected female head of state in Africa, steering the country toward unification and reconstruction.

“The infrastructure [of Liberia] is gone; it’s like starting all over again,” says Bishop Guillory, who experienced firsthand the road conditions — only 400 miles of road are paved in the country. “It’s like the aftermath of Hurricane Rita: No water, no electricity,” he says, referring to the storm that hit Texas in 2005. “The difference is, within a few weeks we were up and going again.”

But Bishop Guillory also saw signs of hope. “The president is determined to better the country. She is putting a great emphasis on education and getting rid of corruption.”

She’s also focusing on agro-enterprise and is interested in working closely with CRS in this field.

Now that he’s returned to Texas, Bishop Guillory is spreading the word about Liberia and CRS’ role in the country. His goal, he says, is to “make people more aware” of the needs in developing countries and the good work CRS does. “You have to look beyond your own household, beyond your own community,” he says.

Bishop Curtis J. Guillory celebrates Mass at St. Dominic’s Parish in Tubmanburg, Liberia. Photo by Lane Hartill/CRS.

Most Rev. Curtis J. Guillory SVD, Bishop of Beaumont, Texas, who is on Catholic Relief Service’s Board of Directors, is visiting Liberia this week. Yesterday, Bishop Guillory visited St. Dominic’s Parish in Tubmanburg, which has received CRS funding over the years.

At the parish, Bishop Guillory was escorted by Father Gary Jenkins who arrived in Liberia in 1973 and stayed throughout the 14-year civil war. Father Gary works with and counsels children who were involved in the conflict. Bishop Guillory met with five young men involved in the war. He also celebrated Mass with community members, ate lunch with church staff, and visited students (and their dormitories). Here are his reflections about the day.

I’d heard about the child soldiers; I’d read about them. But to actually be present with them, especially the five we met with after lunch …

They were playing ball and all of a sudden they were picked up and taken to a camp. I can imagine the shock. These were kids. They were taken away from their parents, particularly their mothers. They were in a totally different environment, a very violent environment — and forced to carry a gun, forced to kill, forced to carry ammunition. Like the one boy said, you could never tell the commanders you were tired.

Yet there is hope for them. With Father Gary and Father Henry at St. Dominic’s Parish, there’s a solid community there to try to integrate them back into society, trying to help them deal with many traumas and to give them a sense that it’s not their fault. That’s one of the points I was trying to make. They’re not responsible for what they saw or what they did because it was forced upon them and if they didn’t do it they would have probably been killed.

When I was talking to them my heart was very heavy. I was trying to imagine what I would do in that situation. To be honest, it’s unimaginable. I guess I would hopefully turn out the way they did. These kids, like I told them, they are really heroes. Not only were they able to survive this ordeal, they seem to be dealing with it. They’re the leaders of the future.

Bishop Guillory at St. Dominic’s. Photo by Lane Hartill/CRS.

The other thing that informed, impressed and inspired me was that those kids were thanking God that they were saved. The faith is just so strong, so vibrant, so alive. All of that is helping to integrate these kids and the whole community because everyone suffered from this extended and brutal and violent war.

I’ve been on the CRS Board now for four years. CRS brings skills. They bring resources, technology. But one of the things that I’ve always found to be CRS’ great gift was the spirit of compassion and understanding they bring. They’re involved with the people. They get involved in the lives of the people. They try to understand the customs and the culture. They come in and try to find out from the people what are their needs and in many cases how those needs ought to be met. CRS really tries to be as much as possible a part of the community, a part of the lives of the people. I think that brings about a great amount of respect, a great amount of trust.

CRS has the reputation of going to those remote places where people won’t go, don’t want to go or can’t go. We’re with the poorest of the poor.

Cardinal Sean O’Malley (far right), chats with (left to right) Rev. J. Bryan Hehir; Joan Neal, CRS executive vice president for U.S. Operations; and Maureen McCullough, CRS Northeast regional director. Photo by Archdiocese of Boston.

Cardinal Sean O’Malley, the only blogging American cardinal we know of, writes this week about his meeting with Catholic Relief Services’ U.S. Operations staff. Joan Neal, our executive vice president for U.S. Operations, and Maureen McCullough, CRS’ Northeast regional director based in Philadelphia, met with Cardinal O’Malley earlier this week to brief him on the work of CRS.

Joan Neal, CRS executive vice president for U.S. Operations (left), and Maureen McCullough, CRS Northeast regional director. Photo by Archdiocese of Boston.

Also at the meeting was the Rev. J. Bryan Hehir, who at one time served as counselor to the president of Catholic Relief Services. Fr. Hehir was also in the news this week when it was announced that he would leave his post as president of Catholic Charities of Boston so he could work more closely with Cardinal O’Malley. His replacement? Another CRS alum: Tiziana Dearing, who most recently had been executive director of Harvard’s Hauser Center for Nonprofit Organizations.

Cardinal O’Malley shared some very kind words about the work of CRS, particularly in the area of serving people with HIV and AIDS. Here are some excerpts from “Cardinal Sean’s Blog:”

They were coming to us about promoting the works of CRS and also the general education of Catholics on social teachings. So much of the work of CRS is to raise people’s consciences of the Church’s commitment on social justice at the international level.

They have a number of wonderful programs. We spoke particularly about the participation of the archdiocese in the rice bowl that CRS sponsors every Lenten season.

I encouraged them to be in touch with our campus ministry people as well as Catholic Television and The Pilot so we could help Catholics in Boston get to know the programs they have.

The exterior of the new CRS World Headquarters in Baltimore. The building was once the home of the Stewart & Co. department store. Photo by Peter Kaizer/CRS.

Catholic Relief Services has a new World Headquarters building! At least, it’s new to us.

CRS moved this week into the Stewart’s building, a former grand department store built in 1899 in what was once Baltimore’s premier shopping district. City leaders are hoping the CRS World Headquarters will be a key piece of a renaissance that is blossoming in Baltimore’s Westside. The office opening was featured in a front-page story in The Baltimore Sun.

The former CRS World Headquarters Building on Fayette St. in Baltimore. The building once housed a straw hat factory. Photo by Peter Kaizer/CRS.

Last week, the CRS staff held a short ceremony to say farewell to the building we’ve occupied since we moved to Baltimore from New York in 1989, but have outgrown. Staff members shared stories, some laughs and a few tears.

Over the weekend, a dedicated crew of CRS employees and the workers of Maryland Office Relocators performed a minor miracle by moving the files, supplies and computers of more than 300 CRS staff and making sure everything was in place and working by Tuesday morning. That included assembling computer setups, connecting them to a new server and installing a new phone system.

The new CRS World Headquarters, located at 228 W. Lexington St., will house approximately 345 CRS staff and will enable us to welcome back 28 staff who worked out of a nearby annex due to space limitations.

On Tuesday morning, as the CRS staff arrived to search for their new work stations, they were greeted by the baroque strains of the CRS Trombone Trio echoing off the stone wall of the three-story atrium at the center of the building. The open environment brings light into the building and will facilitate communication between departments on different floors. The layout, with fewer offices and walled workspaces, desks clustered into “neighborhoods” and corner meeting areas for informal conversation, is designed to encourage collaboration. The new HQ also features a “situation room” with the latest technology that will enhance our ability to communicate with staff in the field and to respond to emergencies like the Indian Ocean tsunami or the Pakistan earthquake.

Business will continue as usual in our new surroundings as we carry out our mission to serve the poorest of the poor — but with greater efficiency and efficacy. A formal dedication is planned for September and a blessing for November, when the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops meets in Baltimore.

The atrium inside of CRS World Headquarters stretches from the third floor to the sixth floor. It will give our staff a sense of cohesion and will encourage conversation and interaction among departments on different floors. Photo by Peter Kaizer/CRS.

Bishops Ricard and Cooney meet with CRS country representative Mark Snyder and head of programming Hani El Mahdi. Photo by Bill Schmitt/CRS.

Bishop John H. Ricard of Pensacola-Tallahassee, Florida, and Bishop Patrick R. Cooney of Gaylord, Michigan, are currently in Sudan to meet with the Sudan Catholic Bishops Conference as well as Catholic Relief Services staff. Here, Bishop Ricard shares some reflections from his first days in the capital.

Khartoum, Sudan — July 24, 2007

For the first time in almost 20 years, Sudan’s bishops are reunited in Khartoum, having come together to participate in the Sudan Catholic Bishops Conference plenary. This joyous occasion marks a new unity, with the separate north and south conferences merged once again into one.

This Sunday on the grounds of St. Matthew’s Cathedral a sense of jubilance and relief prevailed at the open-air Mass and subsequent celebration of music and dance. Around 5,000 people gathered outside the church, expressing an incredible outpouring of affection for the bishops by shaking and kissing their hands. Young dancers and drummers from every major tribe in South Sudan entertained the crowd with music, song, dancing and prayer. The festive mood moved audience members — including nuns, priests and a bishop — to join the dances of their related tribes. This celebration felt like a real turning point, as if people were removing the last restraints of war and feeling free to finally express their faith and joy.

When we met with the bishops the following day, it became clear that the reality in Sudan has changed. Peace has created a whole new set of issues for the conference to address. People returning to the South have rising expectations and are looking to the Church and parishes for schools, medical care and more. Anxiety over delivering all that is needed tempers newfound optimism as people realize that rebuilding won’t happen overnight — even if people are ready to return home now.

Khartoum has also changed. The quiet sleepy town I visited with Ken Hackett in 2004 is now a burgeoning capital with plenty of traffic and construction cranes. There is also a greatly increased presence of southerners, especially young southerners taking advantage of Khartoum’s growing employment opportunities.

Today we will move on to Darfur to visit with some officials and tour CRS projects. Our briefings to date have noted a relative decrease in terms of violence and insecurity and an improvement in the ability to reach more people than before; nonetheless, most access is by helicopter because roads remain dangerous. We should bear in mind that this conflict is far from solved, and 2 million people are still not able to return safely to their homes.

The Sudanese bishops are deeply concerned for their country, both in regard to Darfur and the challenges of facilitating return to the South. They are working closely together to address common problems and are speaking with a unified voice. This represents a new day and is clearly the result of the long-term commitment of CRS and other NGOs who stuck by the Sudanese people, walking with them and accompanying them in their struggle.

Peace and hope for the future now exists between the north and south. May it soon reach Darfur.

Here is the article on Jennifer Poidatz, who was interviewed by Roger Amsden when she was on home leave last month. We are able to reprint this with Roger’s permission.

Cause and effect

by Roger Amsden, Sunday News Correspondent
The Manchester Union Leader

Jennifer Poidatz, CRS/India. Photo by CRS.

Jennifer Poidatz has seen in vivid detail the genocides in Rwanda and Burundi, and the terrible toll of the 2005 tsunamis in Sri Lanka.

Since growing up in the Lakes Region, Poidatz has spent most of her adult life as a relief worker in trouble spots all over the world.

What amazes her most about her work, she said, is the resilience and courage of the people she tries to help: people who are victims of conflicts or acts of nature that they have no control over, who have lost family members and relatives, along with their homes, livelihoods and material possessions.

“They have an ability to bounce back and persevere. It’s amazing to me that people can maintain their dignity in times of crisis like the people that I’ve worked with have been able to do. As someone who lives in the Western world, I can never complain again about life here after having seen what people in these countries have had to endure,” she said.

Poidatz last year was named to head up all of Catholic Relief Services’ programs in India, which with over 1 billion people, is the world’s second-most populous nation.

Poidatz, who grew up in Meredith and graduated from Inter-Lakes High School in 1983, said she has been so inspired by the people she has worked with that she sometimes feels guilty about her work.

“I really feel that I get a lot more out of this than I give back. Hopefully I can pass that along to my children,” said Poidatz, who says that her own parents, Joe and Susan George, who now live in Ashland, helped her to shape her own view of the world by instilling in her the idea that people of all nations, faiths and colors should strive to live peacefully together.

“I’ve always had an interest in seeing other countries and other cultures and wanted a profession where I could do this as work. And becoming a relief worker was one way to accomplish that,” said Poidatz, who joined the Peace Corps right after she graduated from the University of Vermont in 1988 and spent two years in Benin, West Africa, managing a growth-monitoring program for Catholic Relief Services in 11 villages.

For the next two years she worked as a research assistant with the United Nations University Food and Nutrition Program, helping to develop an International Food Intake Directory to provide data on dietary intakes in developing countries. She earned her master’s degree in International Nutrition from Tufts University with her research.

After serving as intern with CRS in Ghana she was sent to Rwanda in 1994, which was in the throes of a genocidal civil war. There she helped start emergency relief and reestablished a CRS office. She also designed and implemented a feeding program for vulnerable groups and seeds and tools programs for resettled populations.

It was the first in a series of “crisis” assignments in countries devastated by ethnic or political violence. Stints followed in Haiti in 1995, Burundi, which was wracked with civil strife, in 1996 and Angola, during that country’s civil war in 1998. Most recently she was in charge of tsunami relief efforts in Sri Lanka.

She’s felt that her life has been in danger many times.

“There have been times when it’s been pretty tense. You’re being stopped at checkpoints by one group while there’s shooting down from the hillside by opposition groups. We usually travel with United Nations escorts but even then it’s at a lot of risk going into these areas,” she said.

Poidatz is married to François Poidatz, an engineer from France whom she met in Angola during the civil war there. Francois is also involved in humanitarian work as a consultant: He worked most recently in Indonesia before heading to Pakistan, where he’s working with earthquake relief crews.

The couple have two children, Gabriel, 6, and Madeleine, 3. Podiatz and her daughters were able to spend a few days late last month with her parents in New Hampshire.

“It was great to take them swimming in Squam Lake and enjoy some time with my family,” said Poidatz. After the break, she flew to India where she resumed overseeing 13 local CRS offices that work with nearly 3,000 partner organizations to carry out projects that promote social justice, equitable access to resources, and empowerment for marginalized groups. She said her office’s priorities include eradicating child labor and strengthening community-based care and support systems for families affected by HIV/AIDS.

Catholic Relief Services is the official international humanitarian agency of the Catholic community in the United States. The agency provides assistance to people in 99 countries and territories based on need, regardless of race, nationality or creed.