CHA to offer CEO forums 2 Benedictine’s brand refresh 7 PERIODICAL RATE PUBLICATION
AUGUST 1, 2020 VOLUME 36, NUMBER 8
Hospital’s meal program boosts spirits of givers and receivers By LISA EISENHAUER
A family carries away weekend meal packages provided by Mercy Medical Center in Canton, Ohio. The hospital began the meal program this spring amid the novel coronavirus pandemic to address food insecurity in a low-income neighborhood. It is funded through a grant from the Sisters of the Humility of Mary.
A weekend meal program started in March has helped to nourish families in an impoverished section of southeast Canton, Ohio, and provided a spiritual lift to the group from Mercy Medical Center behind it. The meal program began in March when the city’s schools closed because of the COVID-19 pandemic, said Sr. Carolyn Capuano, HM, vice president of mission and ministry at Mercy Medical Center. The hospital is part of Cleveland-based Sisters of Charity Health System. “We connected with the Canton city schools when it became apparent that the schools were closing and that they were going, thankfully, to provide meals for the children Monday through Friday,” Sr. Capuano said of herself and colleagues at the hospital. “We started talking about what Continued on 6
Peer navigators improve health literacy of Alaskan natives and immigrants City of Anchorage gives weekly COVID updates in 19 languages Carmelite Sisters for the Aged and Infirm novices create cards to send to residents of facilities affiliated with the congregation. From left are Sr. Sharon Rose Carmel, Sr. Dolores Carmel and Sr. Joanne Therese Carmel. Carmel is a “religious name.” The novices do not use their legal surnames.
Congregations find creative ways to support health ministry amid shutdowns Sisters, brothers provide presence, prayer, PPE By JULIE MINDA An immigrant practices teeth brushing techniques she is learning in an oral care class taught by a peer leader navigator in Anchorage, Alaska.
Sisters and brothers in congregations that founded Catholic health systems are
Sr. Peggy Martin, OP, reflects on decades at leading edge of sponsorship changes By JULIE MINDA
Sr. Peggy Martin, OP, retired June 30 as executive vice president of sponsorship and governance for Chicago-based CommonSpirit Health, capping off decades of thought leadership in the Catholic health ministry. A Dominican Sister of Peace and canon lawyer, Sr. Martin was instrumental in the sponsorship changes involved with the merging of four Catholic health systems to form Catholic Health Initiatives in 1996. CHI ’joined with Dignity Health to form CommonSpirit Health in 2019. CHI’s sponsor, Sr. Peggy Martin, OP Catholic Health Care Federation, was Catholic health care’s first ministerial juridic person. (That entity became the MJP of CommonSpirit.) The MJP structure allows for greater lay involvement in sponsorship and has canonical responsibility that had previously been held by religious congregations. The Catholic Health Care Federation was a model for many Catholic health systems. Over her career, Sr. Martin has established herself as a foremost expert on canon law, sponsorship and lay formation. In 2015, CHA awarded her its prestigious Sr. Concilia Moran Award for her creativity and breakthrough thinking. She reflected with Catholic Health World recently on her many years of service.
staying actively engaged with the leadership, clinicians, staff and patients of hospitals and long-term care sites, offering support and encouragement through the long trial of the pandemic. Provincial leaders and others from a sampling of congregations say their
What drew you to a life of ministry, and to the Dominican Sisters in particular? Even when I was really young, I talked about being a sister because I wanted to teach people about Jesus. And as I got older, I never lost that desire to do that. I did look at different congregations, but
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Incarnate Word sisters aid asylum seekers at the southern border
By PATRICIA CORRIGAN
“Hunker down.” That’s the message many medical centers and municipalities are broadcasting throughout the U.S. during the COVID-19 pandemic. But how is that message received in communities that have no comparable phrase in their native languages? A dozen peer leader navigators, part of a multicultural, multilingual health education and outreach initiative in Anchorage, Alaska, have solved that problem, advising individuals they serve to simply “stay home.” The navigators also provide detailed information on handwashing, disinfecting surfaces and wearing masks. Providence Health & Services Alaska has financially supported the program since it began about eight years ago. Continued on 5
Sisters tap their network to deliver necessities to tent cities in Mexico
“The intent was to provide the congregation with action lines moving forward,” said Sr. Adriana Calzada Vazquez, CCVI. “We think of it not as a new program but as a way to invite our partners to collaborate in a more intentional way.” The future became now in March, when COVID-19 threatened both sides of the border. The sisters activated members of their network to address the immediate needs of the migrants they serve by supplying emergency essentials.
By KATHLEEN NELSON
After months of discernment and discussion, the Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word, San Antonio, distilled their vision for the future in five words: Human dignity knows no borders. They had developed a multipronged plan in which the sisters serve as connectors and conduits for their partners and missions in the United States, Mexico and Peru. Playing a vital role is CHRISTUS Health system, of which the congregation is a founder and sponsor.
A woman and children living in a refugee camp in Matamoros, Mexico, wear masks created through the efforts of the Sisters of Charity of the Incarnate Word, San Antonio. Earlier this year the congregation’s Matamoros Mask Project delivered 1,064 masks to a tent city where asylum seekers wait for U.S. immigration rulings on their petitions.
A new path forward The congregation started the process of refocusing its response to immigrants in the shadow of Migration Protection Protocols from the U.S. Department of Homeland Continued on 7