One of Sue Silverstein’s first projects in her new art program at Bishop Gibbons is making beds for the cats and dogs in the local animal shelter.
The Catholic Church can be controversial, but one thing that impresses me greatly is the focus on community service taught at Bishop Maginn and now Bishop Gibbons and other Catholic schools.
Sue, the school’s art and community service teacher, means to use her radical new art program for good, not just to take up time.
She showed me a photo of Alysha, one of the refugee students coming to Bishop Gibbons from Bishop Maginn, with the cat bed she’s making for an animal shelter. She’s even sending some toy cats along.
The students will be making a lot more of these. I’m going to visit the art classes on Thursday. Her art classrooms are set up with eight different bays for all kinds of art, from watercolor to wind chimes.
Seeing people of age so excited about doing good is a great lift.
I left the Catholic Church back in the 1980’s when I had my 8 year old son at mass and they posted large pictures of dead fetuses in the church. The one thing that the church does well is to serve the poor without expectation of them joining the church, In our community, the St. Vincent de Paul Society has a free feeding service for the poor. Before I retired, I supervised a unit in public welfare that assisted mostly homeless to get their Social Security Disability and SSI. My staff would often be looking for a client to tell [mostly men] him/her about an appointment. They would show up the feeding time and meet their clients there, have lunch with them, or put the word out that they were looking for someone. The client would show up within a few days. Yes, the church serves the poor as Jesus requested.