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A Week in Prayers November 14 – November 18
A Week in Prayers November 14 – November 18 1080 1080 SVDP USA

Monday, November 14

Lord Jesus,
You are the light of the world.
Lead me from darkness,
Fill me with the light of Your love
Let it shine forth from me
In all that I do in Your name.
Amen

Tuesday, November 15

Light of the World, fall upon me,
Awaken me from my slumber.
As sure as the flowers
Unfold in the sun
My heart is turned toward You
Amen

Wednesday, November 16

O Lord these gifts You have given me,
My time, my talents, myself,
And even my worldly possessions,
Remain mine and even grow
Only as I give them away,
In Your name and for Your sake.
Amen

Thursday, November 17

O God, Creator of all,
I seek to do Your will.
Speak to me, Lord,
Through the people I meet,
Through events before me,
Through a tiny whisper in the storm.
Your servant is listening
With an open heart.
Amen

Friday, November 18

How will I love the neighbor, Lord?
With the same love I give to You.
From the depths of my soul,
With all of my heart,
And with all the work that I do.
Amen

Daily Prayers are written by Tim Williams, National Vincentian Formation Director.
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11-10-2022 A Letter From Our Servant Leaders
11-10-2022 A Letter From Our Servant Leaders 1080 1080 SVDP USA

On occasion we will be asked by the media, or by Catholic interest groups, to show the impact of the Society on the community and how we measure our success.  I love to be asked about this, but I also hate it.

How do we measure our success as the Society? This is more difficult than you might first think.

For example, our mission states that we are a network of friends, growing in holiness and building a more just world. We do this through personal relationships with, and services to, people in need. No doubt, these are very good intentions! How, though, do we put a yardstick to “growing in holiness?” This is a lifetime journey, and the graduation certificate is earned when you are called Home. Our, ahem, graduates never write back with their alumni experiences!

We can measure services, but here we see a bit of Vincentian Paradox. We can grow, for example, the number of families that come to our food pantries. We can feel good that more people therefore receive some emergency help, and perhaps we can measure what percentage of those in need are helped. (That’s the impact study so much in vogue.) But hold on, our goal should not be to serve more people; in fact, a systemic change goal might be to serve fewer people! If we can help someone to take care of themselves and not need a food pantry, that’s a better result, right? We can instead aim to serve all who need us, but also work to reduce the number who need such emergency help. Don’t fret with how that makes our “numbers” appear – just do the right thing for that family.

When asked what the Society does to combat homelessness, there is an expectation that our answers reflect the numbers of houses we build and people we place into more permanent housing. Yet the larger service the Society provides is in homelessness prevention, by helping people to stay in their home with rent assistance. Even this is an incomplete number. When we help someone with a utility or food bill, this frees funds that can now be spent for their rent bill (and vice versa). Any wonder now why we drive the statisticians crazy?

Outsiders also find it perplexing when we tell them “We don’t count that number” for some of their usual statistics. This reflects our Rule in not being judgmental. Because most Vincentians also have a natural aversion to paperwork, preferring to serve rather than to count services, we count only the most need-to-know numbers. Often this is because a funder or food bank demands it.

We really appreciate that nearly all Councils and Conferences provide some common measurements such as those in our annual national reporting process. This counting tells the story of the Society to the rest of the nation, and most especially our Bishops, which in turn provides us with even more support. We try to keep the requested measures to a minimum, and they do tell a wonderful story of how the Society helps our neighbors in need across the United States. Thank you for completing these annual requests!

What can we reasonably do to measure our success? I propose that first, it is entirely legitimate in our case to measure intent. In an organization that serves people, one at a time, aggregations don’t always work but our individual intentions are charitable and even Holy. We can’t measure how many times someone in need sees the Face of Christ in our Home Visits. We pray that we provide that outcome in every encounter through our smile, our relationship, our prayers. Let’s therefore measure these encounters as outcomes, not just process, with intent in mind.

Further, we may not always measure outcomes, but we can measure excellence. We can work to provide more with less, ensuring that donated funds are spent wisely. Make no mistake, our goal is not to serve the poor efficiently! That thinking leads to impersonal interactions and one-size-fits-all services that often don’t work for the real, live people coming to us not just for material assistance but for prayerful empathy and God’s love. The decisions we make and services we provide through our Home Visits and Conference meetings may not be efficient, but we can assess and work to have truly helpful results for those we serve.

Let’s review annually what we measure and ask if it’s required by outside sources, meaningful to our goals, or just “nice to know,” and then revise to have confidence not only in how we measure but why we measure.

By the way, Vincentians also see the Face of Christ when we serve others. We hear this all the time from Vincentians, who often say that they get so much more out of their Society effort than they put into it. This aggregate result is something I would not dare try to measure. Let us be confident and satisfied that God sees this outcome in each one of us personally, and that He is well pleased.

Yours in Christ,
Dave Barringer
CEO

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11-17-22 A Letter From Our Servant Leaders
11-17-22 A Letter From Our Servant Leaders 900 900 SVDP USA

Television watchers are used to mid-season breaks, long gaps between seasons, and mid-season replacements that all make it difficult to get into a viewing routine for their favorite shows. I’m not sure if the DVR was the answer, or part of the cause, for this programming chaos! Add in a pandemic that severely affected production schedules, and it’s no wonder that the Society’s very own TV show got delayed for its second season. But we are back!

When Season Two of “Our Faith In Action: Today’s Society of St. Vincent de Paul” (or as we lovingly refer to it, OFIA) finally airs this month on the EWTN cable network, it will have been more than three years since our last broadcast. Our Society’s production team of the Orlando Council’s Trace Trylko, independent videographers and hosts, and National staff couldn’t travel during the pandemic, and local services schedules were also thrown out of whack. Fortunately as the show illustrates, the Vincentian services continued during the entire period, even with sometimes significant COVID adaptations.

Set your DVRs or watch live during the week of November 28, daily Monday through Friday at 5:30 PM Eastern / 4:30 PM Central to see five new episodes of OFIA on EWTN. (With as always, programming subject to change.) Another five episodes will air later; at this time we expect this in February. That’s correct, we will air during the week of Giving Tuesday and for some people, the start of the holiday volunteer and giving season. We thank EWTN for this special opportunity – we can’t ask for funds during the broadcasts, but we really appreciate the exposure of our works nationwide to the EWTN viewers, potential material and financial donors, members, and volunteers!

Each episode features SVdP works in at least three different U.S. cities, told from the perspective of our members, their work and commitment, and how they see the Face of Christ in the people they serve. We will feature Home Visits, food pantries, systemic change classes, health programs, workforce development, and so much more that is testament to the variety of Society work as it is most needed in each local community. We also feature local clergy who extoll the works of the Society in their neighborhoods. We could not get to every community, but while you may not see your Council, you will more than likely see your work! Overall for Season Two we travelled to more than 30 locations.

You might also see a sampler of work that your Council or Conference might consider as a new practice, or best practice, for the future. Being creative unto infinity, our Conferences tweak program elements to fit their local needs, so there is always a different approach we can learn from each other.

Please consider watching the 30-minute shows as a Conference, either “live” or recorded. Have a viewing party! Consider using the shows, or parts of them, in your local promotional efforts. Our National office can help you get the clips you need, and the shows will all be on our website for sharing once EWTN airs them twice. The Society owns all of the content except for the EWTN commercials, so everything you see on the show is available to you!

Please help us to advertise the broadcasts this month. Include OFIA mentions in your parish bulletins and other Church and community communications. The National Council will have a broad social media presence to highlight the shows, but please help us to share the postings where you can. We want this great display of Vincentian services to be in front of as many viewers as possible – we are humble, yet proud of what we do for our friends in need. Also, one can’t help but want to join us when you see the hearts of our Vincentians in their work with neighbors. As the Society rebuilds our membership post-pandemic, the OFIA shows can be a great tool to introduce the Society’s charism and works to potential members in the comfort of their living rooms.

As Thanksgiving approaches just before the OFIA airings, I’m thankful as the show’s executive producer for the opportunity to work with so many in our Society to have this second season finally get on the air. Our Vincentian story is so big and so very beneficial that it deserves this broadcast spotlight. I’m thankful for all the Councils and Conferences that took part in our production for sharing their works and their heartfelt experiences of what it means to be a member of the Society of St. Vincent de Paul. None of what you will see on the shows is scripted. In these days of often fake reality television, the “Our Faith In Action” experiences may be the more genuine human experiences as Vincentians demonstrate God’s love on camera. I pray that you will view these special programs and share them with others.

Yours in Christ,
Dave Barringer
CEO

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11-3-2022 A Letter From Our Servant Leaders
11-3-2022 A Letter From Our Servant Leaders 1080 1080 SVDP USA

Dear Vincentian Friends,

I have spoken and written frequently this year about the need to build our capacity to serve. The first focus area of our Strategic Plan is to “Expand and Strengthen our Network of Friends,” with an underlying goal to “Strengthen organizational capacity at Council and Conference levels.” Our service to people in need depends on our organizational strength and capacity.

One of the objectives of this goal in our Strategic Plan is to reintroduce the Standards of Excellence, which were created about 15 years ago as a tool for councils and conferences to evaluate themselves. Those standards included the requirements necessary for our Councils and Conferences to be in compliance with the Rule and their bylaws and also offers best practices that are in place in our most successful locations. Our Governance Committee, with input from our Board of Directors, has dusted them off our Standards of Excellence and has updated them. We are asking every level of our organization to use them to evaluate their structure and operations.

“No work of charity is foreign to the Society of St. Vincent de Paul” is a slogan of our founders that is captured in the Rule. If we are faithful to the basic structures our Rule provides, we have unlimited opportunities to follow the leadings of the Holy Spirit and use our time and talent to meet the challenges we encounter in our communities as we serve those in need. The Standards of Excellence process will help us address those challenges while allowing us to remain faithful to the foundational wisdom of our organization. Referring to the Rule of the Congregation of the Mission, St. Vincent de Paul said, “If you take care of the Rule, the Rule will take care of you.” His counsel certainly also applies to the Rule of the Society that bears his name.

Most of us bristle a bit at the suggestion of compliance, but St. Vincent suggests that we should see following our structure and the guidance contained in our Rule as liberating. It may be why those who came before us used the title of “excellence” as the goal of this process. It is a blessing that the structure of the Society has been laid out for us, and our time and talent don’t need to be spent in changing that.

After being your president for five years, I can tell you that the best Councils in our country have practices we can all learn from. They all will score high on the questions offered in the Standards of Excellence. Part of my duties include working with Councils and Conferences experiencing problems. From what I have seen, those problems are always rooted in issues that would have been identified if these Standards of Excellence had been applied and led to plans for change.

I suggest you go to the National Council website and review the Standards of Excellence documents for Councils and Conferences (click here). For each level there is a Questionnaire, a Reporting Document to be shared with the next higher Council, and a Notes Document that provides background for each of the questions.

You will notice each questionnaire is organized into three sections – with questions about required practices, standard operating procedures and practices, and recommended best practices. Special attention needs to be paid to anything that is not in keeping with the required practices, and a plan for improvement should be made. The other two sections will give you an opportunity to consider recommended best practices for future planning.

I hope this Standards of Excellence exercise will be embraced by your Conference and Council. Keeping our house in order and planning for the future are important for the well-being of our organization. We know many changes are happening in our parishes and communities. Let’s be prepared as a well-organized network of friends to meet the challenges we know are coming.

Serviens in spe,
Ralph Middlecamp
National Council President

 

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10-27-2022 A Letter from Our Servant Leaders
10-27-2022 A Letter from Our Servant Leaders 1080 1080 SVDP USA

We often take modern conveniences for granted. How life has changed from just a century ago in the United States with air travel, television, the microwave oven, the computer, and the Internet. Some of it has even been good!

Let’s look back further to 400 years and to Paris, France. We see none of the items above. Heck, we don’t even see indoor plumbing, penicillin, or widespread literacy. Heating and cooling meant opening and closing a window and starting a wood or charcoal fire and cutting blocks of ice. This is the world of Vincent de Paul (before he was a Saint) and it makes his works all the more remarkable.

Imagine now if Vincent had a cellphone.

In his day, Vincent ran several businesses, raised funds, recruited volunteers constantly, and otherwise organized like the dickens the numbers, the meals, the fuel, the people, and the buildings to feed the hungry and serve God’s neediest across Paris and rural France. Distances were “longer” then because you either walked them or, if you were fortunate, you had a horse or carriage to carry you at a whopping five miles an hour. If Vincent needed someone, he either sent a runner or had to go get them; he couldn’t send them a text or pick up the phone. Leave a message? Ha! Maybe a note on the door or with a neighbor, and even that with hopes that the recipient knew how to read!

Saint Vincent gives us so many examples in which to lead our Vincentian lives. He used the resources of his time to do the best he could with what God gave him. No excuses, just the use of the blessings he had to do all he could to serve. How did he recruit others to help? He rang the church bell, went door to door, preached in the pulpit and met people where they lived and worked to ask for their time and resources to help their neighbors. He delegated, encouraged, and then organized the laity (the Ladies) the religious (the Daughters) and the clergy (the Congregation of the Mission). He then provided the structures (the Rule) and prayed. A lot.

As Vincent’s organizational descendants we have many more tools at our disposal, including relatively more discretionary time and money, than most of the Parisians of Vincent’s day. We have communications and transportation technology that make the loads lighter and the distances shorter between our volunteers and people we serve. We have only modern-world problems!

This month as we consider our Fall activities and start of our alumni gatherings, church festivals, and holidays, please think of St. Vincent for a moment. How would he utilize these days of friends getting together to recruit – in pairs, face to face? How would he organize an evening of Vincentians in a Conference meeting, each with the modern-day miracle of a cellphone and a roster of inactive members, to hold an old-fashioned phone-a-thon to make some calls to invite them back, celebrating with each “new-found” friend? How would he inspire a Conference President or young adult to give a brief Invitation to Serve address at Mass, followed in the school hall or elsewhere nearby by other Conference members welcoming prospective members into our ranks? As his example inspired a young Frederic Ozanam and his friends nearly 200 years ago in Paris, how can that same zeal demonstrated by Vincent inspire us today here in our community?

Technologies change over time. Yet history reminds us that many of the needs of our world are timeless and universal. Fortunately, so too are our Church’s eternal examples of the Saints, none so more than our Society’s patron, St. Vincent de Paul.  Let us learn from, and live by, the examples with which he has graced us.

Yours in Christ,
Dave Barringer
CEO

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Stores Corner — How To Use Facebook To Your Advantage
Stores Corner — How To Use Facebook To Your Advantage 1200 628 SVDP USA

By: John Thelen
Mideast Region, Council of Lansing, MI

Our St. Vincent de Paul Store’s Facebook Page is used as an informational tool to educate and inform followers about our mission and how our store helps us to achieve our mission. To increase our followers, we’ve posted signs throughout our store, (dressing rooms, restrooms, donation intake, store entrance, cashier counters, etc.) inviting people to LIKE our Facebook Page. We list our Facebook Page on business cards that are available at various places throughout our store that show our store and donation hours and the telephone number to request assistance.

Each week, we will advertise our color sale for the week. We use Facebook to show case unique, higher value items to draw customers into our store. Our community has several trader pages, so we will post items to pages that we feel will help us reach our targeted audience for the particular item we have available. We post pictures of the item, along with the price and indicate our address where the item can be seen. We’ve had good success bringing new people into our store that otherwise would not have visited. 

We also use Facebook to further the work of our mission to serve our ‘Neighbors in Need.’ During Covid, when our store was forced to close, we used Facebook to show how we collaborate with other agencies within our community. We would share links to mobile food pantries and the food banks that are available in our area. We’d take pictures as we partnered with agencies to collect care bags for those that had to quarantine in motel rooms so they didn’t expose other family members still at home. We used Facebook to promote the collection of blankets and sleeping bags for the homeless. Facebook followers could see what we really were all about. That we were doing the work of St. Vincent’s even though our store was closed.

As you watch your Facebook LIKES increase, you can see when followers share your posts, which helps communicate important, timely information. Be sure to continue inviting your staff members, volunteers, fellow Vincentians, church members, collaborating agencies, etc. to LIKE your page which will continue to grow the number of people that can help tell our story. It has been said that St. Vincent de Paul is the “best kept secret” within many parish communities. Let’s help to change that. Our work with ‘Neighbors in Need’ should be discreet, but sharing about the greater good that we do needs to be shared. 

If we don’t share it, who will?   

The National Stores Committee is a group SVdP store folks that represent each SVdP Region and are committed to best practices in support of SVdP thrift stores for success across the nation. Find great topical articles from the Region Reps here in the Stores Corner of the E-Gazette on the last Thursday of each month.

Connect with a Region Rep to learn more about what they are doing in your area – list of committee members can be found under the Resources drop down at https://www.svdpusa-thriftstore.org/

Check out the SVdP Stores webpage! You’ll find tons of great information regarding all things stores!?

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10-13-2022 A Letter From Our Servant Leaders
10-13-2022 A Letter From Our Servant Leaders 1367 1520 SVDP USA

Dear Vincentian Friends,

Looking at the history of our Society, it is clear that the providence of God has given us the leadership we have needed at every point along our path so far. This month President Renato Lima de Oliveira declared the International Year of Jules Gossin, to honor the second President General of the Society of St. Vincent de Paul. Gossin succeeded Emanuel Bailly and served as president from 1844 to 1847. Except for Bailly, our founders were young college students. Yet, when they selected his replacement, they looked to a man who was actually five years older than Bailly. The Society needed Gossin’s stable guidance for a few more years before it turned leadership over to a 28-year-old Adolphe Baudon, who would become our third and longest-serving President General.

We are in the process of electing our next national President. What is the leadership that we need next? You are each invited to participate in that discernment process through prayer and review of the material available on each of our two final candidates. Before you vote in your Conference meetings, I urge you to view the videos of the speeches John Berry and Brian Burgess gave at our recent National Assembly. You may even want to watch their speeches as part of a Conference meeting, and you should read their written platforms. We have two very qualified candidates; so please take the time to make an informed choice. We trust that in God’s providence we will be blessed with the leadership we need for the future.

Let me return to Jules Gossin and share a little about his contributions to our Society that are still relevant today. His presidency was a key bridge between our Society’s founding and its becoming a stable worldwide institution. Several years earlier, Gossin had founded another organization of Catholic lay people, the St. Regis Society, which was dedicated to regularizing the marriages of the poor. From the development of that group, he undoubtedly learned many lessons that were applicable to the challenges our Society faced as it grew.

Gossin’s most important contribution was the maintenance of a central governing structure that aggregated new conferences and required adherence to the Rule. Our first United States Conference in St. Louis was welcomed by Gossin with a letter dated May 25, 1845. The letter informed the Conference that its application for aggregation had been enthusiastically approved at the February 2 meeting of the General Council. The letter encouraged the Conference members in their work and their hopes for continued expansion in the United States. Today, some Conferences would prefer to act independently from the structures provided, but that would not be in keeping with the model passed on to us.

Even more interesting to me is that in the next letter from Gossin to the U.S. Conference members, he insists that they submit an annual report. At this time of the year, I hear complaints about having to file our annual reports. Some say that this is onerous and should not be required in our organization. Don’t look to history to validate your opinion. Gossin wrote to the new Conference in St. Louis on Nov. 16, 1846, “Dear Sir and Brothers, We have the pleasure of sending you herewith a report form for the use of your Conference and we beg you to answer it. We are asking this to enable us in the General Report for 1846, which shall soon occupy our attention, to give all information concerning your Conference. We hope that you will comply with our wish and that you will not only answer with the statistical sections but especially that you will give us details concerning the works which you are performing, their moral results and the good which you expect to accomplish. … Before leaving this consideration, may we add a few technical details. It is hoped that in totaling the amount of your income and disbursements you will terminate as of October 31st. Thus we will be enabled to give to the Conferences the exact amount of revenues for the year.”

Gossin continued, “We also pray you to send us the report by mail as soon as it is compiled. Each year we make greater and greater efforts to hasten the publication of the Report, and we hope this year to achieve our ambition.”

Our annual reporting requirements are important and have always been part of our tradition. I echo our second President General’s request: Please get your reports in by the deadline so that we can publish our National Council Annual Report in a timely manner. It is by this means of accountability that we can give testimony to the good we accomplish together for so many.

Serviens in spe,

Ralph Middlecamp
National Council President

P.S. I really enjoy history and will share a few more of Gossin’s insights during this year dedicated to his memory.

 

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10-06-2022 A Letter From Our Servant Leader
10-06-2022 A Letter From Our Servant Leader 1363 1363 SVDP USA

It is often said that history is written by the winners. For example, if our country’s Revolutionary War had been won by the British, our Founding Fathers would have been largely forgotten traitors and Benedict Arnold might be remembered today as a protector of the Empire. Perspectives are largely formed through the prisms of those who have benefitted from the experiences.

Let’s consider this, then, from a Catholic perspective. Who decides when something is the work of the Holy Spirit?

We hear this all the time when something good happens, right? When our position wins in a courtroom battle, when a storm misses our home, and when just the right leader has taken our parish or our Society’s Council to greater heights, we thank the Holy Spirit for being present and gracious in our lives. But hold on a minute. Does this mean that the Holy Spirit was actively working against that other position, those other homes that were damaged by the storm, and those other candidates who offered to help but who weren’t selected to lead?

Is the Holy Spirit really that personally involved, and indeed even that capricious? That doesn’t sound like part of the Holy Trinity to me.

We know from the Book of Isaiah that God’s thoughts are not our thoughts, and neither are our ways the Lord’s ways. Thus, we can’t begin to understand the presence and plans of the Holy Spirit, except perhaps to believe that the Holy Spirit is always with us, from our worst days and most unspeakable tragedies and pain to our most joyous days and celebrations. It’s all part of God’s plans for us that we don’t, and may never, understand.

We can be defeatist about all this and assume that because it won’t matter anyway, let’s just sit and be God’s lump of clay, simply exist with as little effort as possible, and wait until He calls us home. Or, since you are probably a Vincentian reading this column, you have instead assumed that God put you here for a purpose. You may not fully understand that purpose, but you assume it is for good! You further understand that the Holy Spirit helps you develop your potential for that good.  The Society of St. Vincent de Paul is just one of the tools given to you to build your spiritual formation, to serve God’s chosen people the Poor, and to help develop the good in others, too. Indeed, how could the Society have blossomed around the world to more than 150 countries and 800,000 members without the Holy Spirit’s guidance?

Who decides when the Holy Spirit is at work? At times, at least, we do. Not only when, but where- in the streets, in homes, in prisons, in nursing homes, in hospitals and shelters, wherever we do our works of mercy and hope. It is there extensively, and consistently – every day around the country and around the world. We are the chroniclers of today’s presence of the Holy Spirit through our lives and service.

Yours in Christ,
Dave Barringer
CEO

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09-29-22 A Letter From Our Servant Leaders
09-29-22 A Letter From Our Servant Leaders 720 720 SVDP USA

Dear Vincentian Friends,

It is the time of the year when hurricanes make headlines as they leave suffering and damage in their wake. I ask you, your Conference, and your Council to consider contributing generously this month to our National Council Annual Disaster Appeal. This is the best and most effective way to get disaster aid to our members working in the United States in cooperation with our Disaster Services Corporation and to provide disaster relief throughout the world through our international structure. This appeal allows us to respond quickly to requests. It also provides funds for disasters that may not make the headlines in your local media. Our Conferences in those areas often need our help just as much as those located where a major hurricane strikes.

Once again, this month in Puerto Rico, such a hurricane struck. The Society of St. Vincent de Paul will be working through our members there to provide assistance to their neighbors in need. We are just starting to get communications from our members in Puerto Rico and are waiting to hear how we can help.

But, as I was writing this, another hurricane was headed toward Florida — with unknown consequences. This illustrates the reason why we have one annual collection that can then be used as we learn the actual needs our Vincentians identify after disasters.

The Society’s Disaster Services Corporation (DSC) gives us excellent capacity to serve after a disaster. The DSC constitutes a knowledgeable team to provide training for our members and to secure private and governmental grants that greatly expand the ability of the Society to serve in these situations. The support the National Council provides for the DSC’s efforts is largely funded by this Annual Disaster Appeal.

In the past year, the DSC has helped Councils in every region of the country respond to floods, tornadoes, wildfires, and hurricanes. The success of this appeal last year meant that we did not have to keep sending out fundraising requests for every one of these efforts. I suspect you would become annoyed with the National Office if we did that.

This appeal will also support the international relief provided by the Society through the Commission for International Aid and Development (CIAD). My position as a vice president on the International Board of Directors is responsible for these grants, and I can assure you that this assistance is very much needed to support the work of our members throughout the world. I also can assure you that the use of the funds is monitored closely, with appropriate reports for accountability.

Again, a single appeal allows us to fund response to many disasters you will never hear about. The single appeal also avoids funds being designated to a country without the capacity of members there to use donations that well-meaning councils might otherwise send.

Before committing funds to a particular disaster, it is important to be certain the local Councils have the people and capacity to put our donations to work. Days before Hurricane Fiona stuck Puerto Rico, a Southeast Region team — led by John Berry, Isabel Darcy and Pam Matambanadzo — were on the island working with our members to strengthen our presence there. While they were in Puerto Rico, they observed that people still have not recovered from Hurricane Maria five years ago.

When major disasters strike, the need for assistance can last for many years. Long after the reporters have left, our Vincentians will be there helping their neighbors.

Please be generous in supporting this campaign. Frédéric Ozanam saw the Society as a network of charity. The network he envisioned has come to embrace the world. It is at its strongest and most caring when we support the work of Councils and Conferences of our Vincentian sisters and brothers faced with relieving the unforeseen suffering of a natural disaster. Finally, let us all be committed to praying regularly for the safety and emotional health of all those who are suffering from the results of these storms and those who are dedicated to bringing them aid.

Serviens in spe,
Ralph Middlecamp
National Council President

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