Diocese of Charlotte launches ‘sister parish’ program to aid recovery after hurricane

CNA Staff, Oct 21, 2024 / 15:30 pm (CNA).

Weeks after deadly Hurricane Helene dumped record rainfall on western North Carolina, the Diocese of Charlotte is encouraging parishes to band together to create “sister” partnerships for mutual material aid and spiritual support over the next six months.

Bishop Michael Martin noted in an Oct. 10 email to the diocese’s 160 priests that parishes need to be ready to help each other and the community even if they themselves did not suffer serious damage.

“While some of the immediate needs have been cared for, our longer-term walking with the people affected … remains an important ministry of our local Church,” the bishop said as reported by the local Catholic News Herald.

Parishes that are partnered with a “sister” can hold second collections to help offset lost operating revenue in their sister parish, offer monthly Holy Hours to pray for their sister parish, and check in with the parish regularly about the need for pastoral help or volunteers, the bishop noted.

Parishes can sign up for the program and the diocesan chancery will pair up parishes based on their resources and level of need.

Helene made landfall in late September in Florida’s sparsely populated Big Bend region, bringing a nine-foot storm surge to some areas and knocking out power for millions.

Weakening into a tropical storm over land, it wrought deadly flooding and damaging winds inland in Georgia, Alabama, and the Carolinas.

The city of Asheville, North Carolina, a gateway to the Smoky Mountains about 125 miles west of Charlotte, was especially hard-hit along with hundreds of smaller communities. Nearly 100 people have died in North Carolina as a result of the storm.

Martin told CNA earlier this month that he and diocesan staff took a trip to several of the harder-hit areas in the Charlotte Diocese to survey the destruction and offer aid to stricken residents, including in the towns of Hendersonville and Swannanoa.

The diocese has been heavily involved in relief efforts, with the diocese’s first truckload of supplies from Charlotte arriving in Hendersonville 48 hours after the storm.

The diocese has since, as of Oct. 17, delivered 48 box trucks and 16 pickups and trailer loads of supplies to the communities of Asheville, Boone, Brevard, Hendersonville, Linville, Swannanoa, and Waynesville.

Monsignor Patrick Winslow, vicar general and chancellor of the Charlotte Diocese, recently consulted with pastors who lived through Hurricane Katrina in Louisiana to get advice on how to transition from addressing immediate to long-term needs.

Donors from “all 50 states and six countries” have donated some $3.8 million as of Oct. 17 to response-and-recovery efforts led by the diocese’s parishes, schools, central administration, and its Catholic Charities agency, the diocese said.

People can learn how to pray for North Carolina’s recovery and donate financially by visiting this page.