Status of Redemptorists in New Orleans
Hello:
Lately I've found myself arm wrestling with my BLOG template. It's played a few tricks on me in the few months that I've been BLOGging but recently it had started shoving my posts to the bottom of the page. To someone visiting for the first time, the BLOG had a decidely abandoned appearance. After much cursing, refreshing, tweaking and finagaling - I think it looks 'ok' now. The margins are still a little whacked looking, but I think it will hold until I get a chance to design my own layout or geta hired gun. So anyway - I'm sitting here wallowing in the great injustice of my BLOG not aligning nicely, when I get an email update about how the Redemptorists stationed in New Orleans are getting along. My perspective seemed to be restored pretty quickly.
Just a quick refresher. I work for Liguori Publications, a Catholic publishing house owned by the Redemptorist Fathers. The Redemptorists have a significant presence in New Orleans and we lost contact with several of our guys during Katrina. Several of them are still down there doing what they can to help the recovery and I've been sharing updates as they come through.
The orignal posts are:
Somber Affairs
Thursday Ramble (not as relevant)
Redemptorists in New Orleans - Update
Letter from a New Orleans Redemptorist
Update from Redemptorist in New Orleans
So I'll get out of the way now and let you read Fr. Greg's letter.
Peace,
P. Del Ricci - Dark Glass
***********************************************************************************
Dear Family, Friends, Confreres,
I'm having troubles with this computer in Baton Rouge right now, but I will attempt another Katrina/Rita report. I'm still in Baton Rouge, but I'm planning to return to New Orleans tomorrow (Oct 20) to stay. I know that when I get back to New Orleans I won't have e-mail access at least through our normal channel. Our broadband is still not functioning, and the company that supplies it is not telling us anything.
I've been very busy and on the move. I've been doing chaplaincy work at Our Lady of the Lake Hospital here in Baton Rouge 3 days a week (Wednesday - Friday 7:30 - 4:00) That includes being on call for emergencies all night. I was also up in Oconomowoc, Wisconsin for Rector's meetings. I left Baton Rouge on Saturday, Oct 8 and spent the 9th visiting my sister in Milwaukee. Our meetings ran from Monday night until Thursday noon. I returned to Baton Rouge on Thursday evening, the 13th. On Friday and Saturday I was on hospital duty. Sunday morning (Oct 16) I drove down to New Orleans to celebrate a 10:00 AM Mass in St Mary's Church. Fr. Scott, my associate celebrated a 5:30 PM Mass on Saturday at St. Mary Chapel. Attendance was surprisingly good. 50 at the chapel and 100 (or more) at the church. It was a beginning. It was good to be back and see familiar, faithful faces. Unfortunately t! he air conditioning and the sound system were not working in the Church. We did have lights, but there are some electrical problems that need to be addressed.
Anyway, my schedule the past few weeks has kept me out of the communication business. I want to thank all of you who have sent e-mails. I will try to answer the ones that need answering, and thank so many of you who have sent help. But I want to send this general message so I won't have to repeat all the details to each one individually.
When I drove into New Orleans on Sunday I drove through some sections that seem to be returning to life. The traffic and seeing people on the streets bespeaks life. There isn't much of either in our immediate section of the City. Except for the time surrounding our Mass, the streets are eerily empty. One of our parishioners, Judge Dennis Waldron did yeoman's work cleaning the streets around our Church for the Sunday service. The garbage is still there, but Dennis managed to seclude it for our return. He and I are also trying to salvage the ancient historical bricks from the fence wall that the hurricane demolished. Some sections of the City -not too far from us - still have the stench of decaying food. There are a lot of refrigerators wrapped in duct tape lining the streets. There are a few restaurants open on Magazine Street, but all the other business establishments on this once! bustiling street are still boarded up or closed. An A&P is open, and so are a few gas stations. Gas in New Orleans is $2.89. I can get it for $2.59 in Baton Rouge.
Fr. Scott, Deacon Dennis Ryan and I had an impromptu staff meeting after the Mass on Sunday. We divided up some duties. Fr. Scott is going to pursue the electical problems. Deacon Dennis is going to go after some new refrigeration units. And I am in charge of contacting insurance folks about damage to the church and rectory and school. Besides getting our parish community reassembled, there is going to be a lot of physical matters to attend to during the next few months. We will also be about the business of helping folks who have been devasted by Katrina. Some very generous folks have sent us donations - several thousand dollars - to assist persons in need. During the liturgy this past Sunday we observed that most of our poorest parishioners had not yet returned. The reasons could be many. They don't have a way to get back from their evacuation destinations. They don't have the wherewitha! ll to fix up the places they left behind or their housing units are not back in operation. They have no employment to return to at the present time. From things I've heard some folks may not return at all - especially if they can find employment in their new locale. We know that we will be able to use the funds that have been given us. Hope House (right next to our rectory) ministers daily to the poor in our area. We will work through them as well as giving direct aid to needy parishioners.
St. Alphonsus School is not open yet. It is on a list of schools that the Archdiocese wants to reopen. Fortunately it did not suffer flood damage - which is the real school killer. Though many windows were blown out and the roof was damaged, these are fixable. I don't think the school will reopen until January at the earliest.
I spoke with an insurance adjuster on Tuesday. We are authorized to proceed with window replacement in the church and rectory. Hopefully we'll be able to find contactors to do the work. I want to fix the large Church window with something more sturdy than the glass which was blown in (eg Lexan). The insurance will only pay for replacement value of the former window as it was. I also found out that the insurance will not pay for our refrigerators (or contents). The refrigeration problem was caused by the power outage, which the insurance company sees as independent of the hurricane.
The Church has suffered roof damage. In one corner near the tower there is an open hole - accounting for the water that has come through the tower all the way to the lowest level next to the sacristy. The insurance company is supposed to get this covered until contractors can come out and fix the roof. Also the roof tiles along peak of the roof have been lifted or blown off. I have been told that the roof was completely blown away during hurricane Betsy in 1965. At that time St. Mary's Church was closed for 19 years while a new roof was installed.
There's no doubt that the Hurricane experience is a life-changing experience. I don't think anything will be quite the same at least for a long time. On the positive side, this may also be an opportunity to re-evaluate what we have been doing and to effect some creative changes. We may be able to re-invent ourselves in some ways to carry out the mission of Christ and the Church in an even better way.
For me personally, the encounters I had at the hospital, especially with children and families in the pediatric units were the most moving and eye-opening. I can't tell you how much I admire the families who build their lives around their sick children while at the same time they are trying to cope with horrendous losses of homes and property. Thanks to the generosity of folks I gave anonymous donations to some of these families - and they were deeply appreciative. There is so much sadness surrounding children who will not get well, and so much inspiration around the families that won't do anything but love them - sacrificing everything else.
Like I mentioned, I will be returning to New Orleans tomorrow. I will revert to my New Orleans address: The mail service in New Orleans has restarted, but because of the huge backlog of mail we are only getting a little bit each day. I'm not sure if the Post Office is delivering old mail before new mail. Anyway, it may take a while to get mail.
I will continue to send these large e-mails to keep you updated from time to time. Please send this on to people you think would be interested. Thank you for all your interest, love, generosity.
Peace,
Greg
Lately I've found myself arm wrestling with my BLOG template. It's played a few tricks on me in the few months that I've been BLOGging but recently it had started shoving my posts to the bottom of the page. To someone visiting for the first time, the BLOG had a decidely abandoned appearance. After much cursing, refreshing, tweaking and finagaling - I think it looks 'ok' now. The margins are still a little whacked looking, but I think it will hold until I get a chance to design my own layout or geta hired gun. So anyway - I'm sitting here wallowing in the great injustice of my BLOG not aligning nicely, when I get an email update about how the Redemptorists stationed in New Orleans are getting along. My perspective seemed to be restored pretty quickly.
Just a quick refresher. I work for Liguori Publications, a Catholic publishing house owned by the Redemptorist Fathers. The Redemptorists have a significant presence in New Orleans and we lost contact with several of our guys during Katrina. Several of them are still down there doing what they can to help the recovery and I've been sharing updates as they come through.
The orignal posts are:
Somber Affairs
Thursday Ramble (not as relevant)
Redemptorists in New Orleans - Update
Letter from a New Orleans Redemptorist
Update from Redemptorist in New Orleans
So I'll get out of the way now and let you read Fr. Greg's letter.
Peace,
P. Del Ricci - Dark Glass
***********************************************************************************
Dear Family, Friends, Confreres,
I'm having troubles with this computer in Baton Rouge right now, but I will attempt another Katrina/Rita report. I'm still in Baton Rouge, but I'm planning to return to New Orleans tomorrow (Oct 20) to stay. I know that when I get back to New Orleans I won't have e-mail access at least through our normal channel. Our broadband is still not functioning, and the company that supplies it is not telling us anything.
I've been very busy and on the move. I've been doing chaplaincy work at Our Lady of the Lake Hospital here in Baton Rouge 3 days a week (Wednesday - Friday 7:30 - 4:00) That includes being on call for emergencies all night. I was also up in Oconomowoc, Wisconsin for Rector's meetings. I left Baton Rouge on Saturday, Oct 8 and spent the 9th visiting my sister in Milwaukee. Our meetings ran from Monday night until Thursday noon. I returned to Baton Rouge on Thursday evening, the 13th. On Friday and Saturday I was on hospital duty. Sunday morning (Oct 16) I drove down to New Orleans to celebrate a 10:00 AM Mass in St Mary's Church. Fr. Scott, my associate celebrated a 5:30 PM Mass on Saturday at St. Mary Chapel. Attendance was surprisingly good. 50 at the chapel and 100 (or more) at the church. It was a beginning. It was good to be back and see familiar, faithful faces. Unfortunately t! he air conditioning and the sound system were not working in the Church. We did have lights, but there are some electrical problems that need to be addressed.
Anyway, my schedule the past few weeks has kept me out of the communication business. I want to thank all of you who have sent e-mails. I will try to answer the ones that need answering, and thank so many of you who have sent help. But I want to send this general message so I won't have to repeat all the details to each one individually.
When I drove into New Orleans on Sunday I drove through some sections that seem to be returning to life. The traffic and seeing people on the streets bespeaks life. There isn't much of either in our immediate section of the City. Except for the time surrounding our Mass, the streets are eerily empty. One of our parishioners, Judge Dennis Waldron did yeoman's work cleaning the streets around our Church for the Sunday service. The garbage is still there, but Dennis managed to seclude it for our return. He and I are also trying to salvage the ancient historical bricks from the fence wall that the hurricane demolished. Some sections of the City -not too far from us - still have the stench of decaying food. There are a lot of refrigerators wrapped in duct tape lining the streets. There are a few restaurants open on Magazine Street, but all the other business establishments on this once! bustiling street are still boarded up or closed. An A&P is open, and so are a few gas stations. Gas in New Orleans is $2.89. I can get it for $2.59 in Baton Rouge.
Fr. Scott, Deacon Dennis Ryan and I had an impromptu staff meeting after the Mass on Sunday. We divided up some duties. Fr. Scott is going to pursue the electical problems. Deacon Dennis is going to go after some new refrigeration units. And I am in charge of contacting insurance folks about damage to the church and rectory and school. Besides getting our parish community reassembled, there is going to be a lot of physical matters to attend to during the next few months. We will also be about the business of helping folks who have been devasted by Katrina. Some very generous folks have sent us donations - several thousand dollars - to assist persons in need. During the liturgy this past Sunday we observed that most of our poorest parishioners had not yet returned. The reasons could be many. They don't have a way to get back from their evacuation destinations. They don't have the wherewitha! ll to fix up the places they left behind or their housing units are not back in operation. They have no employment to return to at the present time. From things I've heard some folks may not return at all - especially if they can find employment in their new locale. We know that we will be able to use the funds that have been given us. Hope House (right next to our rectory) ministers daily to the poor in our area. We will work through them as well as giving direct aid to needy parishioners.
St. Alphonsus School is not open yet. It is on a list of schools that the Archdiocese wants to reopen. Fortunately it did not suffer flood damage - which is the real school killer. Though many windows were blown out and the roof was damaged, these are fixable. I don't think the school will reopen until January at the earliest.
I spoke with an insurance adjuster on Tuesday. We are authorized to proceed with window replacement in the church and rectory. Hopefully we'll be able to find contactors to do the work. I want to fix the large Church window with something more sturdy than the glass which was blown in (eg Lexan). The insurance will only pay for replacement value of the former window as it was. I also found out that the insurance will not pay for our refrigerators (or contents). The refrigeration problem was caused by the power outage, which the insurance company sees as independent of the hurricane.
The Church has suffered roof damage. In one corner near the tower there is an open hole - accounting for the water that has come through the tower all the way to the lowest level next to the sacristy. The insurance company is supposed to get this covered until contractors can come out and fix the roof. Also the roof tiles along peak of the roof have been lifted or blown off. I have been told that the roof was completely blown away during hurricane Betsy in 1965. At that time St. Mary's Church was closed for 19 years while a new roof was installed.
There's no doubt that the Hurricane experience is a life-changing experience. I don't think anything will be quite the same at least for a long time. On the positive side, this may also be an opportunity to re-evaluate what we have been doing and to effect some creative changes. We may be able to re-invent ourselves in some ways to carry out the mission of Christ and the Church in an even better way.
For me personally, the encounters I had at the hospital, especially with children and families in the pediatric units were the most moving and eye-opening. I can't tell you how much I admire the families who build their lives around their sick children while at the same time they are trying to cope with horrendous losses of homes and property. Thanks to the generosity of folks I gave anonymous donations to some of these families - and they were deeply appreciative. There is so much sadness surrounding children who will not get well, and so much inspiration around the families that won't do anything but love them - sacrificing everything else.
Like I mentioned, I will be returning to New Orleans tomorrow. I will revert to my New Orleans address: The mail service in New Orleans has restarted, but because of the huge backlog of mail we are only getting a little bit each day. I'm not sure if the Post Office is delivering old mail before new mail. Anyway, it may take a while to get mail.
I will continue to send these large e-mails to keep you updated from time to time. Please send this on to people you think would be interested. Thank you for all your interest, love, generosity.
Peace,
Greg
posted by Philip Del Ricci | 3:50 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home