The Seton Enablement Fund:
Meeting Our Grace By S. Patricia Wittberg
The Mission of the Seton Enablement Fund Committee is to assist the Congregation in living its Mission by providing loans and investments to community-based organizations that may not qualify for conventional financing as they serve the social justice needs of people living in poverty.
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ollowing Elizabeth Seton, the Seton Enablement Fund has seen each loan request as a call from God to “meet our grace” in the pressing needs of those we serve. This has been especially important since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. In spite of the fact that we were unable to meet and consider any loans this past spring, the Seton Enablement Fund Committee met three times during Fiscal Year 2020, and made seven loans in the areas of affordable housing and job training in the United States, as well as microlending in developing countries. Five of these loans are described below. Housing is becoming more and more expensive, compared to the amount of money families can earn. Most U.S. cities have a shortage of affordable housing units that runs into the tens of thousands; Hamilton County alone lacks 40,000 houses and apartments that poor and workingclass families could afford to rent or buy. Capital for Change provides loans to nonprofit and socially responsible developers of affordable housing throughout the state of Connecticut. Since 2016, Capital for Change has created/preserved 2,550 20
affordable housing units, primarily in the poorest and largest urban centers of the state. Its goal is to create or preserve approximately 700 affordable housing units each year for communities throughout Connecticut, and the Seton Enablement Fund loan will help them achieve this goal. It is difficult for most people to find work in this time of quarantine; for disabled people it is far more difficult. The Disability Opportunity Fund provides technical and financial services to individuals and organizations which serve the disabled throughout the United States, with a focus on affordable housing, education, vocational training, and employment. The Seton Enablement Fund’s loan will be added to their investment portfolio and will directly benefit a thousand individuals with disabilities. Another category of persons who have difficulty finding employment are veterans and the spouses of current armed services personnel. Liberty Source hires and trains these men and women in high-demand skills of accounting, data curation, financial research, and data analytics, which Liberty Source then provides to its banking and investment clients. The Seton Enablement Fund loan will be used to attract new clients, which will then enable Liberty Source to hire at least 75 more military spouses and veterans. If the pandemic has caused financial hardship in the United States, it has affected developing countries even more
severely. Several Seton Enablement Fund loans have gone to organizations which help develop women and other marginalized rural people in these countries. Friendship Bridge offers small loans to impoverished women in Guatemala who work primarily in rural villages where they cannot access traditional financing. Loans average $400 for four- to 12-month terms. Friendship Bridge’s program also includes participatory education and provides preventive health services. One Acre Fund gives loans to small farmers in six African countries, providing agricultural inputs, financing, training, and market facilitation that will enable them to grow out of hunger and poverty. They also teach methods to help maintain and promote soil health, so that future generations can continue to grow nutritious food without having to clear more forested land. One Acre Fund also engages in green business activities by supplying clean energy products to smallholder farmers: for example, in 2018 they sold 190,000 solar lights and 16,000 cook stoves. With each of these loans, and with all of the 409 loans that the Seton Enablement Fund has given since its inception in 1979, the Sisters of Charity answer Christ’s call to feed the hungry, shelter the homeless, and care for the stranger. We at the Seton Enablement Fund are both proud and humbled by what the Congregation can accomplish through these loans, and we look forward to “meeting our grace” in the coming year. I n tercom
