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[Back to index of October articles] Faith in Works By Paul Donnelly “What do we want to have accomplished in a year?” Peter Hildebrandt’s question to a small crowd in St. Columba’s Great Hall on a recent Wednesday night summed up the post-Katrina mood for Episcopalians in the diocese, whose initial shock and generosity at the catastrophe has given way to determination and faith in works. “I contributed money, of course,” Hildebrandt—a volunteer firefighter for 20 years—went on, “but that left me feeling as if I hadn’t done very much.” The meeting, organized by the Rev. Deacon Helen Trainor, director of ministry development at St. Columba’s, drew members from 13 parishes, some from as far away as La Plata. The purpose of the gathering was to determine what the diocese and its congregations had done in response to the hurricane, and how relief and development efforts might best be coordinated and sustained. The diocese’s initial response to Katrina consisted primarily of raising money and facilitating communications. Bishop John Bryson Chane issued an appeal for contributions to Episcopal Relief and Development or to a diocesan-administered relief fund, and the diocesan staff began publicizing needs expressed by the dioceses of Louisiana and Mississippi. Efforts became more focused when Amy Whitcomb Slemmer, director of policy and change management for the American Red Cross—and a parishioner at St. Alban’s, asked the communications office to circulate a request for temporary housing to local Episcopalians and the diocese’s ecumenical partners. Her goal, she said, was to move the evacuees who were being brought to a shelter at the District of Columbia Armory into people’s homes as soon as possible. Twelve members of the diocese offered their homes by contacting the diocese at In succeeding days, the diocese used its Web site (edow.org) and special editions of the e-mail news bulletin Church House News to circulate Slemmer’s appeals for volunteers to work at the Armory shelter and to field telephone calls and e-mails at the Red Cross’s national headquarters on E Street, NW. “We trained 60 Episcopalians at our first training session, and about 150 in all,” she said. “Actually I can’t be sure they were all Episcopalians because people would pass on the request. But those e-mails produced a significant core of our new volunteers.” It was obvious, however, that there was untapped expertise and good will in the diocese, and the group of 50 that assembled at St. Columba’s was determined to channel it. Bob Haslach, a St. Columba’s parishioner who is a consultant on urban policy for the Brookings Institution, ran the meeting with classic think-tank tactics: big idea questions, small group answers, and finally decisions and commitments. The problems were quickly defined: “We’re partnering with Saint Luke’s in New Orleans,” said the Rev. Hannah Atkins, associate rector of St. John’s, Lafayette Square, “to identify individual families we can partner with.” Promptly asked how St. John’s had known which church to partner with, Atkins said, simply: “I called the Diocese of Louisiana.” Craig Lefeberve of St. Mary Magdalene spoke up: “We need some kind of triage, so we’re not all swamping them with phone calls and they spend all their time responding to offers of help.” So Bob Haslach wrote it on the big white pad: “That’s our first big idea—we need a forum to focus the response.” Then he added another big idea, drawing a graph of the contributions to Katrina relief that showed a bulge while the news was full of dramatic rescues and dire needs, which rapidly declined as the shock became old news. The Rev. Margot Critchfield of Saint Alban’s reinforced his point: “It’s going to depend on us, on how we follow through. I see a lot of priests preaching this from the pulpit.” Haslach kept the focus on effectiveness, telling of the evacuee mother of a professional colleague who has been going from temporary to short term shelter with just the clothes on her back, a garbage bag of possessions, “and a big bag of toothpaste, because that’s what people had sent as relief. They were a gift. So the message is - no more toothpaste.” Then he said, look the fact is, many people have been abruptly uprooted, they’ve lost everything: “What they really need is walking around money so they can make a decision. And therapy. My vote would be for long term counseling services.” Slemmer told the group heartbreaking yet reassuring stories about rooftop rescues and e-mails from places that somehow have Internet access but no water. One, reading “When are you coming to rescue us?” was caught among the 18,000 or so in the Red Cross’s spam filter. Participants eventually formed three circles of chairs, each with a leader and a theme. Trainor’s group concluded that each parish should have a specific person to contact for offering help, who in turn would have an individual at the diocesan level who would build a relationship with officials in the dioceses of Louisiana and Mississippi. Carole Lee from St. John’s, Lafayette Square, explained: “They clarify the need, we clarify the resources we can bring to help.” Another circle sought concrete plans to sustain direct assistance over time. In that group, Seve Christofferson from St. Philip’s in Laurel noted that there is a Laurel, Ms., which suffered from Katrina, “and it has a Main Street, and an historic district,” just like Laurel, Md. Perhaps those similarities would help his parish to stay engaged, he suggested. The Rev. Joseph Trigg of Christ Church, La Plata—which suffered a devastating tornado itself just a few years ago—strongly urged that “church to church, parish to parish, family to family, individual focus” is a way to make the impulse to give effective over months and years. The community rebuilding circle had the longest perspective: “Rebuilding works both ways,” Haslach pointed out. “We help them rebuild their community—and that helps us build our own,” noting that there is a Christian need to find “magnetic places” (Carole Lee’s phrase) where the most good can be done. But he added a cautionary note: “Should places that were lower on the socio-economic scale be torn down or not restored, in favor of a viable business like gambling? What is the Episcopalian response to that?” Perhaps the best way to find out is illustrated by Trigg’s discovery in his own parish of Gulf region expertise: Lee Powell, a La Plata parishioner, was the Clinton White House’s coordinator for economic development in the Delta—and he is now one of the Katrina coordinators for Christ Church: “We need to make a distinction between hurricane relief, and economic development aid. Everybody deserves relief, they were hit hard. But the casinos don’t need economic development assistance, they will do fine. It’s the poor who need that kind of help, and that’s where we should focus our efforts.” By the following week, Trainor and the Rev. William Barnwell, newly installed canon missioner at Washington National Cathedral had emerged as the contact persons for the diocesan effort. Trainor and others at St. Columba’s were organizing a mission trip to Gulfport, Miss., for later this month. Barnwell was at work on ecumenical partnerships in the Gulf, and Paul Canady, the diocese’s deputy for youth, was in touch with his counterparts in Mississippi about potential spring break mission trips. These efforts were still being organized as the Window went to press, but one thing was certain, Trainor said. The devastation was such that there would be plenty of opportunities to help. To contact the diocese regarding hurricane relief, e-mail hurricane@edow.org Use the same e-mail address regarding Hurricane Rita, which was threatening the Texas and Louisiana coasts at press time. The diocese posts frequent updates regarding hurricane relief at edow.org [Back to index of October articles]
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