The Dialog

By Gary Morton

Special to The Dialog

WILMINGTON — Two attorneys who helped the Catholic Church locally through its most dark times in recent history, the child abuse scandals and subsequent suits and bankruptcy proceedings, were honored Sunday by the St. Thomas More Society’s St. Thomas More-Msgr. Paul Taggart Award.

Tony Flynn of Young Conaway Stargatt & Taylor, LLP, and Mark Reardon of Eckert Seamans Attorneys at Law received the award for their work as lead attorneys for major Catholic institutions that were defendants in the cases. Flynn was lead attorney for the Diocese of Wilmington while Reardon headed efforts on behalf of the Wilmington-Philadelphia Province of Oblates of St. Francis de Sales, Salesianum School, and other religious orders, schools and parishes. Read more »

By Gary Morton

For The Dialog

ELKTON, Md. – Quinn Krenzel considers herself artistic.

“I love to draw and a lot of my friends think of me as creative,” the eighth-grader at Immaculate Conception School said. “Art teaches perfection. You need to be precise and you need to be steady.”

Quinn translated those attributes to her penmanship over her years at Immaculate Conception. She trained her eyes and her hands to produce the proper slant and curve of individual letters and to properly place them together as taught in the Zaner-Bloser Inc. handwriting curriculum, which her school uses. Read more »

By Gary Morton

Special to The Dialog

Marie had a job at a poultry plant in Sussex County but needed short-term assistance paying her bills when she went out on a medical leave, so she turned to Catholic Charities. As case worker Danielle Deputy worked with Marie (not her real name), her needs and desires went further than temporary assistance.

Marie wanted to change her life, starting with her job.

Diane Giovannozzi, a case manager for Catholic Charities’ Basic Needs Program meets with client. The Dialog/wwwDonBlakePhotography.com

Fortunately for Marie, Catholic Charities had just added a financial coaching service to its Basic Needs program in New Castle, Kent and Sussex counties of Delaware; previously the program offered only emergency one-time assistance to people who get behind on their rent, mortgages, or other bills. The goal of the financial coaching, according to Basic Needs program director Crystal Conley, is to provide tools that people on the edge of financial disaster can use, such as seeing where they spend their money and setting up a family budget, and to help as much as possible if the person wants to seek a better job.

The expanded service allowed Deputy to work with Marie on several occasions to polish her resume and to groom her job-interview skills.  But what Marie needed most to find a job in marketing was confidence. “It was pretty much just encouraging her,” Deputy said. Their work paid off. Marie now is a sales agent for a supplemental medical insurance company.

Success stories such as Marie’s led Catholic Charities  to expand the case management aspect of the Basic Needs program starting in April, when Deputy will work full time on case management. The basic program, assisting people in overcoming financial crises, will continue at the same level, with no additional cost, through a realignment of duties among the staff.

The Annual Catholic Appeal helps support the Basic Needs and other programs of Catholic Charities, as well as more than 30 other ministries offered by the Diocese of Wilmington. The goal for this year’s appeal, with the theme “Do You Love Me? Feed My Sheep” (taken from John 21:15-19), is $4,347,000.

Commitment Weekend, when Catholics in the pew will be asked to pledge to the 2013 campaign, will be April 13-14.

Conley, who began as Basic Needs director slightly more than a year ago, said requests for assistance have grown sharply in recent years. In the past case workers met with people seeking assistance to help pay rent or mortgage, food, and energy costs; if it was determined to provide assistance, Catholic Charities would make a payment to the vendor on behalf of the client. Usually only one meeting was necessary.

“It helps people who for whatever reason find themselves in need of utility or rent assistance,” she said. For those who live from paycheck to paycheck, “if somebody’s car broke down, they have to fix it but then can’t make the rent payment.”

Last year the Basic Needs program began requiring two meetings, one to go over the emergency funding request and the other to delve into the financial coaching aspect. Not everyone wanted the expanded service, Deputy said, so some would come in for their Basic Needs appointment, make a second appointment to meet program guidelines, but skip the follow-up session. That led to the tweaking of the program so that Deputy will coach full-time in Dover and Kent counties for those who want and need the service, which both Deputy and Conley believe will be popular.

An example of how the financial coaching works was seen in a woman who had trouble making ends meet even though it looked like she made enough to cover her expenses, including food, Conley said. As they went over the list another time, the woman realized she did not include cigarettes among her expenses, Conley said. She smoked about a pack a day, which at a price of about $5 a pack totals about $150 a month – blowing her budget.

“We were able to offer her some options,” Conley said, such as stop smoking; cut expenses elsewhere, or get a better job or a supplemental job. The choice is up to the client.

The same applies to helping someone find a better job. “They have to want to empower themselves. I can’t do it for them; my job is to guide them,” Deputy said.

She looks forward to more success stories but realizes not every client will succeed as well as Marie did.

“You can’t save everybody,” Deputy said, “but that one person I can make a difference with makes it all worthwhile.”

By Gary Morton

Special to The Dialog

Nellie Kahalehili awoke in her hospital room one day last year to find Sister Mary Rita Smith sitting in a chair next to her bed.

“I had to think, ‘who is this?’” the 93-year-old Kahalehili, a retired nurse, said. “But it was good to see her. It made me feel good. I didn’t get too many visitors.”

Marion Biederman (left) and Dorothy Smith (right), residents of Marydale, confer with Sister Mary Rita Smith at Marydale Retirement Village. (The Dialog/wwwDonBlakePhotography.com)

The visitation was part of a day’s work for Sister Mary Rita, pastoral/community services coordinator at Marydale Retirement Center in Newark. But her work is specialized, bringing comfort and a desire to help residents of the 108-unit complex overcome challenges such as working their way through red tape to acquire benefits through various government and agency programs.

Sister Mary Rita’s work at Marydale, which is operated by Catholic Charities, is funded in part by the Annual Catholic Appeal. The goal for this year’s appeal, with the theme “Do You Love Me? Feed My Sheep” taken from John 21:15-19, is $4,347,000. Money raised will support more than 30 ministries of the Diocese of Wilmington.

Commitment Weekend, when Catholics in the pews will be asked to pledge to the 2013 campaign, will be April 13-14.

For Kahalehili, Sister Mary Rita is someone she can rely upon; her closest relative, also elderly, lives in Perryville, Md. Kahalehili is a widow, and her only child drowned years ago.

“She’s like my good aunt, Aunt Mary,” Kahalehili said of the nun. “She’s always there when I need her.” Once, after one of Kahalehili’s recent hospital stays, Sister Mary Rita worked with her doctors and pharmacy to clear up a mistake over her prescriptions.

“Sometimes I feel I have to be a detective to find out what is going on,” said Sister Mary Rita, a member of Scranton, Pa.-based Sister Servants of the Immaculate Heart of Mary.

Her hospital visit with Kahalehili fits Sister Mary Rita’s vision of pastoral services, which she described as working to ensure “the well-being, physically, mentally and spiritually, of a person.” She also arranges for a Mass and an interfaith service each month.

Before coming to Marydale in 2010, Sister Mary Rita was a pastoral assistant at Andrews AFB in Maryland. While she worked with a retired population at that base, most of her work was with young families. Previously she taught and had been a principal of Catholic schools.

She’s discovered that she’s “a resource person” who can sometimes best help a resident by simply sitting back and listening.

“That’s all they need, to get it out, think out loud.”

Other times she takes a more direct role, such as working with Kahalehili and with Maggie Gagnon, 63, who lives on a disability pension.

“She’s always at my beck and call,” Gagnon said of Sister Mary Rita. “She answers questions for me, especially when I had problems with my mother,” Millie Gagnon.

Millie lived at Marydale when Maggie moved in four years ago. Millie developed Alzheimer’s disease, which caused most of Maggie’s stress over her mother. “I felt I could talk to Sister Mary Rita and be very open about it,” she said. “She always encouraged me to take care of myself. That was the hardest thing; to remember that I did not do any good if I gave everything to my mother and did not take care of myself.”

Sister Mary Rita was in a unique situation when the two Gagnons lived across from each other.

“We did a lot of listening, didn’t we,” Sister Mary Rita said to Maggie. “I know how hard it was on her because she had to bear the brunt of it.”

Millie Gagnon, who turns 80 on June 1, now lives in a Wilmington nursing home.

But Maggie Gagnon is not alone at Marydale. A cousin lives on the same courtyard, and there’s always Sister Mary Rita.

“She’s just a phone call away. I know that,” Gagnon said of Sister Mary Rita. “It’s important to have someone who’s looking out for you, who’s got your back.”

By Gary Morton

Bishop Malooly has asked Catholics in Delaware and on Maryland’s Eastern Shore to show their love for Jesus by helping feed his sheep — by raising $4,347,000 through the 2013 Annual Catholic Appeal.

The campaign’s theme is “Do You Love Me? Feed My Sheep,” taken from Jesus’ command to Peter in John 21:15-19. The Annual Catholic Appeal is a major source of income for more than 30 ministries operated by the Diocese of Wilmington.

Read more »

By Gary Morton

Special to The Dialog

The St. Thomas More Society banquet was a family affair May 20 when the group presented its Msgr. Paul Taggart-St. Thomas More Award to the unofficial law practice of Kirk, Kirk, Kirk, and Kirk. But the awardees – siblings William E. “Bill” Kirk III, Richard D. Kirk, and Susan Kirk-Ryan – felt their father, the late William E. Kirk Jr., was the real honoree.

“If you ask the three of us … the criteria for this St. Thomas More award simply and clearly describes our Dad,” former deputy attorney general Kirk-Ryan, 57,  a hearing officer for the Delaware Department of Health and Social Services and member of St. Joseph on the Brandywine Parish in Greenville, said in accepting the award.

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By Gary Morton

Special to The Dialog

The sound of children singing in Spanish filled the living room of a house in Ocean City, Md., area.

“I am the church, you are the church. We are the church of God. Jesus calls us living stones. So let’s build the church of God,” were the English lyrics of their song.

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By Gary Morton

Special to The Dialog

SMYRNA – Bishop Malooly is calling for Catholics to speak out against a federal mandate that, despite a narrowly written exemption for religious institutions, would require many Catholic institutions to provide insurance coverage for contraceptives and sterilizations.

The health care reform act’s guidelines by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services “threaten religious freedom and our rights more than ever,” he told about 40 people at a Mass for the Unborn at St. Polycarp Church March 26. Catholic colleges and hospitals, and other institutions, would not be covered by the religious exemption. “We need to respond and to act.”

Read more »

By Gary Morton

 Special to The Dialog

Emily Hurst looked at the slice of bread Lynn Lemon held up for the special needs religious education class at Church of the Holy Child.

“Yum yum yum,” Emily said, as Lemon explained to her students that when they are hungry they might eat a slice of bread.

Taking an unconsecrated Communion host, Lemon described it as a different type of bread that at Mass is changed into the Bread of Life, Jesus. When people are hungry “in their hearts,” or spiritually, she told her students, they can receive Communion.

Read more »

By Gary Morton

Special to The Dialog

Brad Williams used to go through a costly routine. Every night after work he would drink 10 to 12 beers. Somehow, he managed to get up the next day and go back to work.

“I was functioning,” said Williams (not his real name).

Read more »