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Should We Think of the Society as an Apostolate or a Ministry?

In Catholic Church circles, there has been a debate over the last 20 years about what to call church groups – “ministries” or “apostolates.”  “Ministry” seems to be the favorite as it’s easy to say, but in recent years there has been more of a push to use the word “apostolates.”  I want to argue the Society of St. Vincent de Paul is more of an apostolate and why it’s important.

In the book, Modern Catholic Dictionary by John A. Hardon, S.J. (from my area of Southwest Michigan), Fr. Hardon defines ministry as “authorized service of God in the service of others, according to specified norms revealed by Christ and determined by the Church.”  This means:

1. service of God, who is glorified by the loving service given to others
2. authorization by the Church’s hierarchy … this authorization may require ordination …
3. based on the teaching of Christ, who showed by word and example how to minister to people’s spiritual and temporal needs;
4. under the guidance of the Church in accordance with her directives and decrees.

Based on the above, I think the easiest way to think about a “ministry” is that it’s concerned with the Sacramental mission to bring people to Christ through the Sacraments. All four of Hardon’s definitions directly connect to the Sacraments. While   it is a great cause of the Church to connect people to the Sacraments, it is not necessarily the mission of the Society of St. Vincent de Paul.

We have a unique calling, and a unique ability, to witness our faith not just within the Church, but in the world. Frédéric explained that our Church and world lives are not split into two: we need to both determine the truth and to live it. This is why he was insistent that the Society remain “profoundly Catholic without ceasing to be lay.” In addition, the universal call of the laity to the apostolate, there are groups defined under Canon Law as lay apostolates, including the Society of St. Vincent de Paul. Despite not being a “ministry,” we always remember that living an apostolate or charism includes, definitionally, serving the good of the church.

What is an apostolate?

The word “apostolate” comes from the word “apostolic,” meaning that the Church, through the succession of and following in the example of the apostles, is SENT out into the world to spread the Gospel.  So, an apostolate is an organization that is sent out to spread the Kingdom of God.

“Indeed, we call an apostolate ‘every activity of the Mystical Body; that aims to spread the Kingdom of God over all the earth.’” – (CCC, 863)

I was working at a parish in Chicago when after Mass, an usher SENT me to see a man who was asking for help. His name was Joseph.  He was in an old military jacket and kind of intimidating. He told me he needed help, so I sat down and talked to him.  Mostly, I just sensed he wanted a friend, so I became his friend. I invited him to the church brunch which was happening at the same time right then. People looked at him and me kind of oddly, but we sat and had a meal together. Afterwards, I invited him to come to join me next week at daily Mass.  In those days, I looked after my 3-month-old daughter while I worked, so sometimes I was a little late making it to Mass, and I was late the day he came.  The daily Mass people were a little taken aback when Joseph came to Mass, but when he mentioned my name, they eased up a little. Afterwards, I invited him to come and sit with my daughter and I in my office. This made my priest boss a little upset that I would invite “a man like that” to be so close to my daughter and “I had to think about protecting my family.” But then I explained that I was trained as a Vincentian at another parish and Father Bob was quickly on board. “Oh, I didn’t know you were a Vincentian!”

Joseph and I would often sit during daily Mass and afterwards he would come to my office and talk with me and play with Naomi. I visited him quite a few times in his little dorm room he called a one-room apartment, which was above a bar. As time went on, he was getting more involved in the parish and offered to help grill during our parish picnic. People were starting to get to know him. Then suddenly, I got the call that Joseph died.

Father Bob asked me to lector at Joseph’s funeral. I came up to the ambo, 9-month child in my arms, and proclaimed the Word of God being very clear that I was connecting Joseph to a holy person in my gestures and silence. Afterwards, Joseph’s father came up to me, as Joseph had been estranged from the family. He asked, “You knew my Joey?”  I told him how we would sit in daily Mass together. He was so touched that Joseph came back into the Church, and the Church welcomed him.

The Holy Spirit SENT me to that moment. From the time I was a 10-year-old in the DRE’s office to now where I am a DRE, I don’t know exactly what the Holy Spirit is. I don’t know the Holy Spirit’s plan or exactly what He wants me to do. But tell me any story, and I can point him out. I love that Guy! He helps empower people to SEND people where we need to go.

Based on the Holy Spirit, the Society SENDS out Vincentians to encounter our neighbors in need. We do not just sit idly by; we are active in our apostolate.

The Vincentians see they cannot do this work alone. Vincentians SEND requests to pastors and parishes to get funding, food and more volunteers to help alleviate suffering of our neighbors in need.

Pastors SEND their parishioners to help or join the Vincentians in their mission.

Parishioners SEND their donations to the parish, which Vincentians are more than happy to organize, for our neighbors in need.

Vincentians see the need for greater organization and elect Conference and Council presidents and SEND them to our national assembly for their input and training to continue to grow our Conferences and Councils.

Conferences SEND Vincentians to Ozanam Orientations so we can be trained and respond to those we serve.  That Ozanam Orientation helped me respond to Joseph.

Vincentians see the overwhelming need and SEND Vincentians to do systemic change.  Systemic change is transformation. It is to change the systems, structures, mindsets, policies, and root causes of poverty. Systemic change is not the symptoms; it is holistic; it is collective action; it is complex and strives for a lasting impact. By embracing the apostolate nature of being sent by God, we strive toward systemic change in all things of the Society.

Voice for the Poor SENDS Vincentians to our government officials to advocate for our neighbors in need. Sometimes we go in person. Sometimes we send messages via voter voice. You can join voter voice here: https://ssvpusa.org/take-action.

Blessed Frédéric Ozanam prayed for faith and consecrated his life to God’s service (Apostle in a Top Hat, pg. 28). When the early Vincentians were forming the Society, Blessed Rosalie Rendu trained them and SENT them to the poor. We are grateful to be sent out in Jesus’ name in the instruction of Blessed Frédéric Ozanam and Blessed Rosalie Rendu. They too were SENT to help instruct us. Just as we strive to SEND ourselves to train others in our apostolate.

Below is a closing prayer and reflection. It is said that “the law of prayer is the law of belief” and so I thank the national spirituality committee for the recent update of the closing prayer, which you can purchase here: https://ssvpusa.org/product-category/spirituality/

This prayer, which includes the word “apostolate,” is part of the inspiration for this column. As spiritual advisor in my Conference, I use it as part of the closing prayer. Please note, I’ve adapted the prayer slightly to include the word “encounter” which our National President John Berry, has encouraged us to think about.

Father, grant that we who are nourished by the Body and Blood of Christ in the Holy Eucharist may realize the depths of our needs, respond more spontaneously to the suffering of others, and come to love You more deeply by service to our neighbor. 

Grant us also the wisdom and strength to persevere when disappointed or distressed. May we never claim that the fruitfulness of our apostolate springs from ourselves alone.

United in prayer and action, may we become a visible sign of Christ, and may we give witness to his boundless love which reaches out to all and draws them to love one another in Him.

We thank You, Lord, for the many blessings which we receive from those whom we encounter. Help us to love and respect them, to understand their deeper needs to share their burdens and joys as true friends in Christ. 

Amen.

Blessings,

Bobby Kinkela

OUR INCREDIBLE JOURNEY – AND IT IS FAR FROM OVER!

November 20 is a special date for the Society of St. Vincent de Paul USA. This date marks the anniversary of an event that changed the face of charity in the United States. A date that we celebrate with gratitude this year as we commemorate 180 years since the Society of St. Vincent de Paul was founded in America.

In 1845, in St. Louis, Missouri, at the Basilica of St. Louis King of France (“Old Cathedral”), a small group of laypeople gathered to establish the first SVdP Conference in the United States. What they didn’t know, and never could have imagined, was that this humble beginning would grow into a nationwide network of nearly 81,000 members serving our most vulnerable neighbors with dignity, respect, and genuine friendship for nearly two centuries.

Let’s take a trip down ‘memory lane’ for a moment.

The Atlantic Crossing and a Divine Appointment

The story of SVdP in America begins with an encounter (it is always about encounter) on the high seas. In the autumn of 1845, Father John Timon, a Vincentian priest from Pennsylvania, was traveling from Ireland to the United States. In his hands, he carried something special: copies of the ‘Rule of the Society of St. Vincent de Paul.’ Having just seen the amazing work of Vincentians in Dublin, Father Timon felt called to bring this charism across the Atlantic.

When Father Timon arrived in St. Louis and spoke with Bishop Peter Richard Kenrick about what he had seen, the Holy Spirit moved the Bishop’s heart. He asked Father Ambrose Heim, a local priest who was known for his work with the poor (so much so that he was known as ‘The Priest of the Poor’) to help establish the Society in St. Louis and serve as its Spiritual Advisor.

And just like that, the Holy Spirit lit a fire that has burned for 180 years and counting!

The first meeting on November 20, 1845, brought together men of vision and heart: Dr. Moses Linton, a prominent physician, was elected President and his friend Bryan Mullanphy, widely known for his generous philanthropy, became Vice President. These men and their fellow members understood something essential that remains at the core of our mission today: that serving the poor is not primarily about what we give, but about the relationships we build. It’s about encountering Christ in every person we meet.

The St. Louis Conference was officially recognized by the Society’s International Council in Paris on February 2, 1846. The movement that had begun just twelve years earlier in Paris with young students challenging one another to live their faith more authentically had now reached across an ocean to a young nation hungry for the Gospel to be lived out in action.

Growth and Spreading Grace

What followed was nothing short of remarkable. Just as the Society had spread across France like wildfire, so too did it take hold across America. Conferences began forming in New York (1847), Buffalo (1847), Milwaukee (1849), Philadelphia (1851), Pittsburgh (1852), and soon in every corner of the nation. By the end of the nineteenth century, the Society had established seven major jurisdictions stretching from coast to coast, and in 1857, New York organized the first District Council in the United States.

In those early days, women could not be members, and women’s groups operated in parallel to the men’s society. For example, the Women’s Society of St. Vincent de Paul was founded in Italy in 1856 to support women and children, a role that men were not handling at the time. But in 1968, the SSVP CGI voted to allow women to become full active members, although women-only and men-only conferences continued to exist initially, and new conferences were encouraged to be co-ed. The society’s international rules were changed after 1968, and the process of integrating women continued over the next few years in different countries.

These early Vincentians, many of them immigrants or children of immigrants, understood poverty. They knew what it meant to struggle. They saw firsthand the conditions facing newly arrived families from Ireland, Germany, Italy, and beyond. Beyond distributing aid, they advocated tirelessly for systemic change. They fought to reform almshouses that treated children like prisoners. They established schools, founded boys’ clubs, opened orphanages, and created industrial training programs. The Society didn’t just respond to poverty; it worked to change the systems that created it. That is our approach today as well, and that early focus on advocacy and justice – with roots back to Ozanam and the Founders – animates our work today.

One of the major turning points in the SVdP USA story occurred in 1915 when leaders from seven major councils, New York, St. Louis, New Orleans, Chicago, Boston, Philadelphia, and Brooklyn, made the visionary decision to unite under a single national structure. The Superior Council of the United States instituted on June 7, 1915, with the formal inauguration ceremony taking place at the Catholic University of America on November 21, 1915. The first president of SVdP USA was Thomas Maurice Mulry, a man so deeply devoted to the Vincentian charism that he became known as “the American Ozanam.”

Thomas Mulry personified what it means to live the Vincentian Charism to its fullest. Not only did he lead our Society with profound conviction, but he also became a founder and vice president of the National Conference of Catholic Charities, helped establish the Fordham School of Social Service, and served as a trusted advisor to President Theodore Roosevelt on matters affecting children and families. He understood that a single person, animated by Gospel values and connected to a community of faithful servants, could help reshape an entire nation’s approach to poverty and care. Though he passed away just a year after unifying our national councils, his legacy endures in everything we do.

The Essence of Our Mission Then and Now

Throughout our 180 years of service in America, one principle has remained constant: we create relationships, not transactions. This is what makes the Society of St. Vincent de Paul fundamentally different from many charitable organizations. We don’t simply hand out aid – we sit in someone’s home, listen to their story, offer our presence, and walk with them toward stability and hope.

The Personal Encounter has been the beating heart of our mission since those first meetings at the ‘Old Cathedral.’  Two Vincentians visit a person or family in need, they develop genuine friendship, they listen, maybe they pray together, and then they offer emergency financial assistance with rent, utilities, food, clothing, and whatever else will help prevent a crisis from becoming a catastrophe. This simple practice, rooted in the Gospel, has remained remarkably consistent for 180 years because it works. It transforms both the giver and the receiver. We often refer to the practice as the ‘Home Visit’ based on the early practices of our foundation. But the reality is that the term ‘home visit’ is too limiting to describe the beauty of our work. We engage in human-to-human, Christ-centered personal encounters in many ways and places, not just in someone’s home.

Our Work Today: Serving Over 5 million Neighbors with Dignity

At the Society today, we can see the same spirit animating us that moved Frédéric Ozanam to action in 1833, and those brave founders to build their first Conference in St. Louis in 1845. The scale of our service has grown exponentially, but the mission remains beautifully unchanged.

In the 2023-2024 fiscal year alone, our network of nearly 81,000 Vincentian volunteers:

– Served over 5.2 million people across rural, suburban, and urban communities

– Made nearly 2 million visits to neighbors in need

– Provided services valued at $2.2 billion

– Contributed an estimated $416 million in volunteer hours

But behind every one of these numbers is a human story. The family that avoided eviction because a Vincentian sat with them and helped secure rental assistance. The senior citizen who can now afford her medications because of our charitable pharmacies. The person that had a place to sleep on a cold night because we operated a shelter. The young person who found steady employment through our workforce development programs.

The Many Ways We Serve

Our work has expanded and evolved to meet the changing needs of our communities. We operate thrift stores across the nation. They do double duty: providing affordable and free clothing and household goods while generating funding for our local Conferences to use in their communities. The profits from these stores provide the lifeblood of many of our Conferences and Councils.

Our Food Pantries are a lifeline in neighborhoods impacted by poverty. Thousands of families who are plagued by food insecurity and might not be able to put food on the table depend on the fresh and non-perishable goods we distribute. But we’ve gone further. We operate meal programs and community dining halls that not only nourish bodies but build dignity and connection.

Our ever-accelerating efforts in homelessness prevention meets families on the edge of disaster and provides the financial help and support they need to stay housed. For those experiencing homelessness, our rapid re-housing, transitional, and supportive housing programs work to get people off the streets and into stable housing. Innovative programs partner with landlords, navigate systems, and provide the support services that make permanent housing possible.

Our charitable pharmacies in places like Baton Rouge, Madison, Atlanta, Dallas, Cincinnati, and several other communities are a powerful testimony to our commitment to wholeness. Patients no longer must choose between buying groceries and taking their life-saving medications.

We’ve launched programs like Back2Work that provides customized training, continuing education, and connections to meaningful employment for people impacted by incarceration, poverty, and homelessness. We operate youth and young adult conferences nationwide, recognizing that young people are not just the future of our Society but are already the present, already serving with enthusiasm and idealism.

Our Disaster Services Corporation mobilizes when tragedy strikes, providing long-term recovery support that extends far beyond the initial emergency. DSC has innovated with the ‘House in a Box’ program which delivers essential household items to disaster survivors within hours, sometimes within 24 hours, at no cost to families, with donated values often exceeding $3,400 per box.

This spring, we opened a National Office in Washington, D.C., to emphasize and accelerate our efforts in Public Policy and Advocacy. Going back to the days of Ozanam and the founding members of SVdP USA we recognize that to truly serve the poor, we must advocate for systemic change at the national level. Our voice is now heard in Washington, speaking up for those experiencing homelessness, those struggling with poverty, those seeking re-entry after incarceration, and all vulnerable populations.

What Makes Us Different

In a world of nonprofit organizations and charitable agencies, what makes the Society of St. Vincent de Paul unique? It is this: we believe that growth in holiness is found in service to the poor.

For us, this is not a vocation – it is a calling that shapes our spiritual lives. We do not serve the poor to feel good about ourselves or to check a box. We serve because we believe we encounter Christ in every person we meet. We serve because we have been called by our Catholic faith to live the Gospel, not just read it, and to be the answer to someone else’s prayer, to show up in their moment of greatest need and say, “You are not alone.”

This is why our members and volunteers continue to show up, year after year, decade after decade, century after century. It’s why a seventy-year-old retiree will wake up on a Saturday morning to deliver emergency assistance to a family he’s never met before. It’s why a young parent will take time away from their family to help another family find stability. It is why a businessperson will leave the office to sit in someone’s living room and simply listen.

Gratitude and Hope for What’s Ahead

As we stand here in November 2025, celebrating 180 years of faithful service, my heart overflows with gratitude. Gratitude for Frédéric Ozanam, whose youthful idealism was ignited by a challenging question and transformed the world. Gratitude for Father John Timon and Father Ambrose Heim and all the clergy who saw in the Vincentian charism something essential for the American Church. Gratitude for the countless laypeople, priests, bishops, religious sisters, and above all our dedicated volunteers, who have kept this flame burning bright.

I’m grateful for Thomas Mulry, who showed us that one person’s commitment to the Vincentian mission can influence an entire nation. I’m grateful for all the Vincentians who have come before us, who built our thrift stores and food pantries and shelters, who sat in countless living rooms and changed lives through relationship and presence.

And I am profoundly grateful for you, the 81,000 people who make up our Society today. You are the living embodiment of Vincentianism. Whether you’re folding clothes in one of our thrift stores, distributing food at a pantry, visiting a family in their home, serving on a board, or supporting us financially, you are the heart and hands of the Society. You are how Christ’s love reaches the most vulnerable in our communities.

What’s Ahead – Looking Forward with Eyes of Faith

As we celebrate this milestone, we also look to the future with eyes full of hope and excitement. The needs of our communities are great; poverty hasn’t disappeared, homelessness continues to grow, hunger persists, and so many people are just one crisis away from disaster. But we are not discouraged. We know that with faith, with community, with determination, and with the grace of God, transformation is possible.

We are in an excellent position to accelerate and innovate in how we serve. Over the next years, we will be making significant investments from our reserves and resources (prudently and strategically) to continue to meet people where they are; in rural communities where poverty is often invisible, in urban neighborhoods where visible homelessness breaks our hearts, in suburban communities where struggles hide behind closed doors. But we cannot just throw money and aid at these problems and hope they go away; they won’t. We must continue to invest and build capacity, systems, programs, and relationships that will give us the ability to leverage our resources to do more to address the systemic and root cause issues, not just distribute aid. We must, and we will, help our Conferences and Councils grow. Grow in financial resources, membership, and spirituality. Not just by providing funding and National Office staff support, but by training and mentoring, and helping create the systems needed to thrive. And we will continue and grow our work of advocating for policies and systemic changes while serving immediate needs. We will continue to form young people in the Vincentian spirit so that this charism doesn’t fade but deepens with each generation.

Most importantly, we will continue to remember that every person we serve is precious, beloved, and made in the image of God. Every single person deserves dignity. Every single person deserves to be seen and heard. Every single person deserves a friend who will walk with them toward hope.

A Final Word

On this 180th anniversary of the Society’s founding in America, I invite you into deeper communion with our Vincentian mission. If you are not yet an active conference member, consider joining us. If you are already a Vincentian, thank you and accept the challenge to deepen your commitment, to bring a friend, to mentor a young person in this vocation we love.

Let us commit to making sure that 180 years from now, in the year 2205, there are still Vincentians walking through neighborhoods (or maybe they’ll be flying around on personal hovercraft by then), sitting in living rooms, visiting the poor, offering friendship and assistance, and showing the world what it looks like when people take seriously the Gospel mandate to love their neighbor as themselves.

The work of charity will never be finished in this world. But neither will the grace of God. And as long as there are people experiencing poverty and injustice, the Society of St. Vincent de Paul will be there, formed by 180 years of tradition, animated by the love of Christ, and committed to walking with our neighbors toward dignity and hope.

Thank you for being part of this remarkable story. Thank you for caring. Thank you for serving. Thank you for all you do.

Peace and God’s blessings,

John

The government shutdown is increasingly devastating with every passing day, leaving most federal workers without pay and causing uncertainty and delays in federal programs that serve the poor.  Our most economically vulnerable brothers and sisters should not be forced to go without basic needs as a result of a partisan impasse, and it is time for both Republicans and Democrats in Congress to come together to ensure that the most marginalized among us will not abruptly lose critical benefits.

The Society of St. Vincent de Paul USA, therefore, urges the U.S. Department of Agriculture to immediately use every available mechanism, including the utilization of contingency reserves, in order for the 42 million people who benefit from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) to be able to buy food next month. It would be simply intolerable for people to unnecessarily go hungry as the shutdown heads into its second month.

As one of the largest nonpartisan, lay Catholic charitable organizations in the U.S. with more than 80,000 volunteers, it is not our role to take sides in a political fight. But it is our role and our duty to speak on behalf of the friends and neighbors we serve. Let’s end the partisan politics and find a solution for the common good that will sustain needed programs and the people they serve.

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The first Apostolic Exhortation from Pope Leo XIV entitled Dilexi Te (“I Have Loved You”) is greeted with the utmost joy and appreciation by our 81,000 members of The Society of St. Vincent de Paul USA (SVdPUSA).

The vision outlined by the Holy Father to serve the poor with love and compassion is not only the call of the Gospel, it has been our mission as Vincentians each day in the U.S. and 155 countries since our founding in 1833 in Paris, France.

More than a century ago, Leo XIII began a new tradition in Catholic Social Doctrine, connecting the church’s timeless teaching directly to contemporary circumstances and realities, and reminding the world that although the face of poverty may change, our duty to the poor does not.

More recently, Pope Francis emphatically reminded us that the Church cannot be separated from the poor. The mission of the Church, he said, must always be to embrace the most vulnerable with Christ’s love by meeting their individual material needs, while diligently working to improve societal and governmental systems and structures to lessen the gap between rich and poor.

Pope Leo XIV now continues this tradition with a perceptive and bold exhortation that inspires us to see the face of Christ in each person we encounter. Pope Leo is encouraging and even demanding that each of us take action in our own neighborhoods and communities to improve the lives of our brothers and sisters as we care for them as our neighbor.

At The Society of St. Vincent de Paul, we do this every day through our one-on-one encounters, our shelters and food banks, our work with those leaving prison, our advocacy efforts in Washington, D.C. and state capitals, and so many other programs.

It is in these ways that Vincentians live the Beatitudes and will continue to answer the call of the Holy Father in his first Apostolic Exhortation, Dilexi Te.  

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