TheThe HartfordHartford CatholicCatholic WorkerWorker St. Martin De Porres House St. Brigid House What does God require but to do justice, and to love kindness and to walk humbly... Micah 6:8 Brian Kavanagh Life experiences death, but it is not swallowed up in death. It comes through death perfected and triumphant. Human Beings are not born to die; they die to be resurrected. Easter 2006 Leonardo Boff 1 The Hartford Catholic Worker Established November 3, 1993 Volume 14 Number 2 The Hartford Catholic Worker is published bimonthly by the St. Martin De Porres Catholic Worker community. We are a lay community of Catholics, and like minded friends, living in the north end of Hartford, working and praying for an end to violence and poverty. We are not a —tax-exempt“ agency. We do not accept government funding. Our ability to house the homeless, feed the hungry, and work with the children depends on contributions from our readers. We are not paid. We can be reached at: 18 Clark St., Hartford CT 06120; (860) 724-7066, [email protected] and www.hartfordcatholicworker.org We are: Brian Kavanagh, Morlianna Evans, Sarah Karas, Angela Thomas, Jacqueline, Christopher, Micah and Ammon Allen-Doucot. Good Friday 2006: U.S. Military Base, Groton, CT. Martyrs‘ names scratched un- evenly on the wood Names of nonviolence running into each other almost There would be six cross bearers A man steps forth from the crowd Falling off the cross I volunteered. I don‘t know why. onto a box The orange prison suit was a size A procession followed In the street large At each of the fourteen stations Arms outstretched, black The only one left. I am small The names of those tortured were hooded, head hung My body floated inside read An old woman under the cross But the rest of me felt heavy Along the steel fence approaching A disciple holding her up We did not speak as we walked the gate of the base And in a moment it was over The black hood sealed my head Scourged, condemned, Taken away At the neck He fell again and then again and To be a voice of the voiceless Looking through the gauze for the third time To be hope for the tortured through the fence the chant was quiet To be Resurrection. I am faceless Father, remember me when you Barbara Pivarnik Like those in Barbara Pivarnik come into your kingdom Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib, trying, crying not to Disappear The twelfth station Jesus dies on the cross. St. Martin‘s Calendar W Please join us on Tuesday, June6 at 7:30 PM for the celebration of Mass at St. Brigid House, 18 Clark St., Hartford. Refreshments and conversation follow Mass. THERE IS NO MASS IN JULY AND AUGUST PLEASE JOIN US AGAIN ON SEPTEMBER 5. J Please join us on Saturday, June 24 for a Celebration of the life of Fred Pfeil and a day of appreciation for our volunteers at our Camp Ahimsa in Voluntown. There will be a tree planting to remember Fred, storytelling around a campfire, a pot luck dinner, singing and dancing. For details please call Jackie at 724-7066. 2 All In A Day‘s Work Sarah Karas mortified. underwent surgery so as not to have We are often asked what it is exactly While we continue to bag the food we anymore children and now here she is that we do at the Hartford Catholic Worker receive a phone call from Eve. I am expecting another child. I am not sure upon which I usually explain the philosophy delighted to hear her voice because we what to say or how to react, I am in shock of the Catholic Worker and give a list of haven‘t heard from her in two months. She as I think of all her children. We tell her our ministries (food pantry / co-op, she can pick up her food. furniture pantry, tutoring program, It‘s now 9:00 A.M. and Jackie begins Saturday arts and crafts, summer camp, to make the usual —hooked up“ egg newsletter, giving table, Friday vigil, breakfast with the cracked eggs we cannot round table discussions, etc) but this give out as we await the first food pick up. never seems to fully explain what it is we Folks begin to stream through and amongst do. I often think of our house as the the morning crowd is our friend Eddie. We Miscellaneous House, anything goes and have known Eddie for many years and he it often does. But I think Peter Maurin often comes to us looking for food or (co-founder of the Catholic Worker clothing. We haven‘t seen him in awhile movement) explained it best when he because he was recovering from surgery said, —The Catholic Worker is not an and he only recently began coming again organization, it is an organism.“ Con- for food. Eddie is one of our special cases sider Monday, March 27th in the life of where he gets a food bag a week in lieu of the Hartford Catholic Worker. the monthly food co-op order. Today, In the wee hours of the morning, the however he came to pick up a co-op magic hour (for which I am NEVER up) order, which started a (loud) disagreement when the sun is rising and the birds are on the front porch. With everyone‘s blood singing Chris is en route to the supermar- pressure up Eddie agreed to take his ket to load up on produce, eggs, and weekly bag and sign up for the co-op for meat for our monthly food cooperative. next month. Eddie has a past history of Today we have thirty orders, which means taking food and clothing from us and that each person paid $15 and will selling it on the street to support his drug receive about $50 worth of meat, a habit and so we are cautious about giving dozen eggs, four bags of produce and a to him. He has been working on getting bag of nonperishable foods- hopefully clean and has gained some weight back. It before our after school program starts. can be difficult to negotiate the fine line By 8:00 A.M. the assembly line is in full tilt Ade Bethune between helping others and enabling them. boogie with David, Brian, Morliana, Jackie, explains to me that she has been in Puerto Just when we all think it is safe to Angela and me dividing up each of the Rico with her mother who is dying of cancer continue on with the day a very distraught orders into grocery bags, easy for carrying and she wants to make sure she still has a Rachel shows up at the door with her four- home. We take breaks here and there to food order for her family. Then she gets year-old brother. Rachel, 19, suffers from sip coffee and check email. While searching quiet. I know something is wrong, she is mental illness and has been repeatedly the web for orange jumpsuits like the ones hesitating to talk. With nervousness in her institutionalized as a result of going off her worn by the detainees held in voice she tells me she is pregnant. This will medication. Chris works closely with Guantanamo(for use on Good Friday) be her ninth child. Friends of ours sponsor Rachel, as her conservator, and has Jackie found a website that sells Halloween Eve because she cannot afford to pay the reported to us that, while institutionalized, costumes for children that depict charac- monthly food co-op payment of $15, she was put in restraints during the day in a ters from Abu Ghraib Prison! How however she is worried that they will no (Please see Day‘s Work, p.4) tactless! Needless to say we are all longer pay for her since she told them she (Please see Day‘s Work, p.4) 3 A Day‘s Work, cont to happen to that child, while in Rachel”s care, knowing she could have said something. We know calling DCF is not the best option but room with nothing but a staff member away and Jackie tells him that if he wants the only one we can think of now and so Jackie observing her and a fluorescent light. his food from now on he needs to get out reluctantly calls. We also call Rachel‘s mom to Today she had been babysitting her baby of the car and carry it himself. Thinking he tell her that it was inappropriate to leave her brother and began to feel dizzy and is going to hit her, Jackie goes back into four-year-old with Rachel, that she needed to disoriented while at a downtown bus stop. the house quickly as he gets out and takes pick her son up immediately and that DCF was his bags. He complained about how mean She immediately came to our house with called. Jackie and I were the whole way home. her brother for help because her mother is Meanwhile, folks are still steadily stream- Soon after Eve leaves I take a deep not home. She has only been out of the ing through the house picking up their food co- breath and fix Rachel some peppermint tea hospital a few days. We show her to a seat op orders. In the mix are two middle-aged to have while she meets with Chris. A lot and Jackie begins to explain to Rachel that gentlemen that have obviously had an early has happened and still the day is young so she has to focus on getting better and start on happy hour.