Last week, Lisa Hatch was planning a vacation trip to the mountains of North Carolina. When the coronavirus crisis erupted, she had to cancel the trip.

“It’s a cute little town,” she wrote, and she was disappointed, as so many people were in recent days. “The money I would have used for that trip can be better spent helping the Bishop Maginn students and faculty or staff. So please use it however you want.”

Enclosed was a check for $500.

One of the very good things about the work I do is that as long as there are people like Lisa Hatch  – and too many others to mention – around, I can never lose hope or faith in the goodness of people or the promise of tomorrow.

These generous and trusting and loving people – Lisa knows how to turn a loss into gain – will carry the day.

Lisa is a member of the Army Of Good and a supporter of our work with the Mansion residents and the refugee students. I know her to be a generous and compassionate person, even though I have never met her, She loves in North Carolina.

She is one of those people who has always felt like family. Whenever I really need support or encouragement, she is there.

“I’m going to echo what other people are saying,” she wrote, “reading your blogs and looking at your pictures and videos helps me keep calm during this unsettling time. Plus it usually brings a smile to my face or gives e something to think about – so thank you.”

No, thank you, Lisa.

__

The photo above is the latest batch of gift cards for food for the Price Chopper Gift Cards Program for the Bishop Maginn refugee students and their families. The cards keep coming, and thanks to all of you for helping out during this painful and urgent emergency.

It is a sacred duty to me to help the needy and most vulnerable, and these refugee families are both needy and vulnerable.

Sue Silverstein, a friend, and the theology and art teacher at the school distributes these cards to the people who need them.

She lists the people who need help in three categories.

The first are on the “Critical List.”

These are people she knows have chronic issues with hunger. Some are new refugee families who have lost everything and are struggling to adjust to this country (the federal government has cut almost all of its subsidies to refugees and immigrants) and often have little or nothing to eat and offer their children

There are about 12 students and families in that category. They are already in need.

The second list is labeled “Urgent.’

These are children whose parents have just lost their jobs and are struggling to pay electric bills, insurance, and rent. They are also refugees with little or no reserves.

When they miss a paycheck or two, there is a domino effect that affects their entire lives., they fall behind and it very difficult to climb back. Buying groceries is their most immediate need.

That’s where I would like to focus our help.

The third group on Sue’s list is “Those Who Never Ask.”

These are families too proud or independent to ever ask for help, but who are in growing need of some. Asian families are well known for their reluctance to ask for help outside of their families.

But their need is as great as anyone.

Sue is like an intelligence agency

She talks to students, teachers, parents and keeps track of who is in need.

She buys food for them when she buys her own groceries and brings it to her classroom, she collects clothes and leaves them out with “Take Me” notes and they are all gone by the end of the day.

As the gift cards have started to come in – this big stack photographed above came in today – Sue mails or drops off gift cards to the “Critical List” first.

She had enough cards to send some to the “Urgent” list as well as the “Critical” list last week.

Now, she is preparing to send cards out to the third category, the people who never ask for help but need it and accept it, gratefully.

It is almost certain that all three of these groups will begin to move towards the first list.

The lives of these families tend to be marginal. A recession and it’s the inevitable shrinking of the job market will affect all of the refugee families. The first jobs they get in America are almost all minimum wage jobs, no matter what they did in their home countries.

I know doctors and lawyers and formerly wealthy business people who are cleaning hotel rooms or hospital floors. Some of them will be laid off, some will get sick. Both are catastrophes for their families.

And none of them are likely to get those checks being mailed out to the government.

So I hope to keep the gift card program doing. Things are going to get a lot worse for these people before they get better.

I’ve talked to the refugee families over the past few years while doing this work, and they vary in need. One Bishop Maginn family has nine children (some from other families brought out of camps) and a $50 gift card doesn’t last long.

Most have fewer mouths to feed, most typically four or five people.

My guess would be it takes about $100 to feed a refugee family for a month, two weeks for $50, a week for $25. Any amount is precious and helpful. As this crisis drags on, and its economic consequences become more and more severe, people with no net will bear the brunt of it.

Already, the gift cards are making the difference.

“I just don’t know what they would do without this,” Sue told me today.

Sue showed me some of the thank you messages the parents and children have been sending you, they are beautiful and wrenching.

I don’t want to think about the long-term issues they face, I need to stay focused and concentrate on small acts of great kindness.

Sue Silverstein says already people are asking for help who have never asked for any kind of help before. And it’s early.

These families are thrifty and resourceful, they can make a little money go a long way – they know how to prepare inexpensive and nutritious meals, soups and salads and rice and beans.

But they live week-to-week, and as their paychecks disappear, so do their options.

So if you can and wish to continue supporting this program, as Lisa Hatch and Denise Gayley have done today, you can do so by purchasing Price Chopper gifts cards in any amount. As soon as I get them, I’m shipping them to Albany (I’m grounded right now) and she is trying to build up a reserve.

If you don’t care to purchase things online,  you can send a contribution to me, and I’ll do it: Jon Katz, 2502 State Route 22, Cambridge, N.Y., 12816, or to P.O. Box 205, Cambridge, N.Y., 12816. Please mark your contribution “for Price Chopper Gift Cards.”

For all the pain and suffering all around us, this has been a day of joy and light.

I got a postcard that arrived today that was signed “Barush Bashan.” All it said was “Thank you for inspiring “A Conspiracy Of Love.”

What a beautiful thought. And how accurate. We have become a conspiracy of love.

Here’s to us.