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October
Volume
9
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& H E R A L D
1999
Number
t
5
Serving Catholics I
•
1
I
j
in
Western North Carolina
in
the Diocese of Charlott,
n$ d i
Annual CSS dinner raises dollars for office
3
...Page
'Real choices': Funding
alternatives to abortion
...Page
7
New hues: St. Peter's
Basilica stirs
"
debate
Middle schoolers "rope in" communication, leadership About two dozen middle school youth from St. Philip the Apostle Church
...Page
™Pdesigned to To promote communication, cooperation, trust, personal enrichment, encouragement leadefsMp 1 g g d time 1 kind ° f g0t ° Ver fear ° f hei S hts s id ^lly 12. I earned learned o trust everybody K to here°K because we all worked together and had fun."
restoration
6
is ft
16
dXned
CnT^ *
" r;
^
De
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skills in Statesville gathered Sept 26 near
P<™
challenge
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'
Hurricane Floyd
Local News
Raleigh Social Ministries bring relief to ravaged counties By MATT DOYLE NC Catholic Staff
Faith Formation office
welcomes two coordinators 14
...Page
Noted author addresses educators, catechists
15
...Page
fvcry Week Editorials
& Columns ...Pages
4-5
Entertainment ...Pages
10-11
millennium series! Trivia
2000:
Youth
will
have plenty of activities in
Catherine of Siena Church. It may have appeared like any other normal fall day in eastern North Carolina. That appearance was a deception. Everything was not normal in Tarboro. For some, things will never seem normal again. Hurricane Floyd sliced through this eastern North Carolina community and left it inundated. President Bill Clinton and North Carolina Governor Jim Hunt had descended onto Main Street a few days earlier to bring encouragement and money and to listen to people's stories.
Helicopters still crisscrossed the skies, looking for survivors and watching the river run. National Guard troops cruised the streets and kept vigil at crowded shelters where
victims had taken refuge from a storm that continued to show its rage long after it had ceased to exist.
CSM
Rome ...Page
TARBORO —
The sun was shining and the air was brisk in Tarboro Sept. 22 as a load of goods from Catholic Social Ministries of the Diocese of Raleigh arrived at St.
13
As the group headed along route 64 from Raleigh to Tarboro, it became more evident that something catastrophic had happened. Tall pines were still scattered along the
roadside where they had fallen. Mudcovered landscapes offered an oftengrotesque vista.
Roadways ended
abruptly.
De-
tours abounded. In Tarboro, streetlights were darkened. They stood helplessly at intersections unable to control what happened. St.
Catherine's property escaped
unscathed. The neighborhood had not suffered major damage. Just over the ridge, according to
Rose Gallagher, whose own home
presence known even in the area around the church. It is not that the river itself would make it to the church, but he said the storm drains could no longer empty into the waterway and there was nowhere for the rainfall to go.
While there were no physical damage to the church prop-
signs of
who had
erty, those
gathered
suffered losses
the parish. Spanishspeaking families had sought shelter after losing their homes, at least temat
porarily, to the waters.
They
busied
expressed a sense of urgency for
themselves doing yard work, passing the time until the floods receded. Passionist Father Bill Murphy,
the Spanish-speaking residents
pastor, had
is filled
with a family in need,
of the area.
Many do
Social Security
and
not have
numbers and are
not eligible for assistance. those familiar with the terrain, was the part of Tarboro that has made its
name known around the world, if only for a short time. Walter Bell, former president of the parish council, explained how the Tar River wraps itself around the town putting the low-lying areas in jeopardy.
Bell said that there were times at the height of the storm when it ap-
peared that the river might make
its
his
opened the parish
hall to the victims. Despite a
home
lack of running water, they
able to carry
on and
still
were
all
able to smile.
A small, informal group of parishioners gathered with Kathleen Walsh, director of CSM, to offer their thoughts and reactions to the storm and in some way to vent their feelings and needs to another, an outsider. Rose Gallagher, whose own home with a family in need, expressed urgency for the Spanishspeaking residents of the area. Many do not have Social Security numbers and are not eligible for assistance. is filled
a sense of
See
HURRICANE,
page
8