I see why Sue Silverstein wanted to go to Bishop Gibbons. Principal Kiante Jones is her brother from another mother.

This was our first visit to the new home of our refugee program. It couldn’t have been better or more comfortable.

If you ever want to lift your heart amidst all of the angry and simmering news, sit with Sue and Kiante and the teachers for a while and listen to how much they love the children they teach, how hard they are working to educate them, and how much they love what they do.

I don’t often get to see real dedication like that. It makes the heart smile.

Bishop Maginn and Bishop Gibbons have a lot in common. People say Bishop Gibbons was Bishop Maginn a decade ago. Yet they are also very different.

(Bishop Gibbons is bigger than Bishop Maginn but just as poor.)

The schools are both in poor towns, have poor students, and fight the challenging and often dispiriting fight of urban schools competing with affluent suburban families and students daily.

But I can tell you in all  honesty that any child who gets to go to this school is fortunate, and will have every chance to succeed and learn and grow.

Kiante Jones, like his art teacher Sue, thinks day and night about how to help these kids, whose lives are full of struggle and uncertainty. Money is always a struggle for the school, the kids, and the teachers.

Many of these children are refugees who have lived through unimaginable horrors; others suffer the grinding drama of poverty. They are fortunate to have such dedicated teachers as Kiante, Sue, and others I met this week.

You can feel the warmth the minute you enter the building. It can’t be faked.

In addition to the Asian, African, and Latino refugees I met at Bishop Maginn, Afghan refugees and Ukraine refugees attend Bishop Gibbons. I’m eager to meet them.

(Sue wanted her many friends out there to have her new e-mail: Here it is: [email protected]) She wants to hear from you.)

I hadn’t met English Teacher Tricia White for five minutes before she heard I was a writer, collared me in the hallway, and signed me up for a creative writing class.

She is impressive; I’m very eager to work with her.

A notoriously dedicated and hard-working teacher, I’m meeting Trish next Thursday at the school to interview her and talk about the writing class.

She, Kiante, and Sue evoke the best of great teachers and are inspiring to watch. They fill me with hope and turn complex lives around.

 

(One of the first things Sue rescued from the movers was Maria’s Blessed Mother quilt, which someone bought for Sue and hung right up in the center of the new art room. Maria’s already signed up to teach a class.)

This is the right place for me and our fight, and we are honored to join it at this new school, which is everything we had hoped for. Strange how darkness so often leads to light.

They are welcoming and dedicated and need us in every possible way.

They understand the value of access and photography and are open to both. I told Kiante what I told Bishop Maginn; no photos will ever be taken without permission.

To talk to Kiante is to know someone honest and full of compassion and integrity. The word that keeps coming to mind is genuine.

It will be an honor to work with him. And a creative joy. My job is to help the students in the school during difficult times. I couldn’t have a more meaningful challenge.

Sue Silverstein, who nearly did herself in during these past difficult years at Bishop Maginn, is as happy as I’ve seen her, which is good news for her students.

She has already signed up Maria to teach a class on how to make lap quilts for the residents of nearby nursing homes.

 

(Folasade was with Sue helping her paint the art room today. You may remember Folasade; we raised money for her tuition (her brother’s too) last year and this coming year at Bishop Gibbons. She is the best; she is looking forward to her senior year and plans to be a pediatrician.)

Sue is in art and teaching heaven; she’s been babbling like a teenager over her eight-room art complex in the basement; she is going to have a blast making all kinds of art. She is bursting with plans and ideas.

Next Thursday, Maria and I are bringing buckets of vegetable plants for food pantries donated by John Reiger’s Country Power Products center.

We also are buying 300 bulbs for the “Mary Garden” at Bishop Gibbons, which will produce food and flowers for nearby nursing homes. This is Sue’s first Community Service project at Bishop Gibbons.

We hope to help Sue and the school by supporting an Amazon Bishop Gibbon Art Wish List going up next week here on the blog and on Amazon. It will be our first Amazon Wish List for the school. We did more than a dozen at Bishop Maginn.

 

 

Principal Kiante Jones is the same as Sue – honest, caring, open, listening, feeling, and warm. Their lives center around and worry about their students and plotting to improve their lives and educations and prepare them for life in the outside world.

Bishop Gibbons is bigger than Bishop Maginn, has roughly twice as many students at 200, and has an extensive athletic playing field out the back door. I’m on fire to get to work there.

I could not have been more welcomed, felt more comfortable, or met more genuine people. This is the place for Maria and me.

And Zinnia wasted no time in making new friends.

What seemed like a tragedy became a boon for many children. Thanks to the Army Of Good, every refugee who wanted to go to Bishop Gibbons is going. That is a miracle, and thank you.

We have more work to do, and it’s good work.

Our motto: It’s better to do good than argue about it.

We won’t jump aboard the nasty train that’s crisscrossing our country. I am not a Christian, but I follow Jesus Christ and embrace his call to help the needy and vulnerable.

Thanks for joining us on this new mission. I am ready to get going, buoyed by a wonderful visit to a special place.

This is the happiest of stories to tell.