Lawson and three other men were found dead inside city manholes near Coveleski Stadium last week.
The deaths of Lawson, 53, Michael S. Nolen Jr., 40, Jason Coates, 29, and Brian G. Talboom, 51, have all been ruled homicides.
Authorities released no new information Friday regarding the deaths of the homeless men.
[Jerry] Eason spoke fondly about Lawson at the Mass held at Our Lady of the Road, a drop-in center at 744 S. Main St. About 80 people — primarily friends and a few family members — attended the Mass, which was followed by a potluck dinner.
The Mass was for Lawson, a Catholic who stayed at the Catholic Worker House, but all of the victims were prayed for.
Category: Houses of Hospitality
The Saint Isaac of Ninevah-Gift of Tears Catholic Worker Farm, Spencer, West Virginia
I went down to Spencer today and spent the afternoon chatting with Jean Kirkhope at the SIONGOTCWF.
This Catholic Worker farm hosts service groups, raises some money through cottage industries, and does other Catholic Worker stuff. Not much farming at the moment. Their three dogs are awesome. Their location has moved around in recent years, and for all I know they’ll move again soon.
I like their greeting cards, especially the ones with the icon of Ammon Hennacy. If you ever want to buy me a gift, I could use pretty much an unlimited supply of these.
These dogs are so sweet.
Our Lady of the Road opens
The South Bend Catholic Worker celebrated the beginning of Advent today with the grand opening of their new daytime drop-in center at 744 South Main Street, Our Lady of the Road.
The event began with a mass celebrated by Father Paul Kollman, CSC. Well over 100 people were there.
Before
Photos: Grand opening, history of the building since mid-August.
After
(I’ve been sifting through the 800 hobo names for Our Lady of the Road, or Boxcar Mary, but no luck so far.)
From the program book:
Our Lady of the Road is a day-time drop-in center for folks who find themselves on the street. We will offer coffee, snacks, use of the restrooms, showers, and washers and dryers to do clothes. Most of all, however, we will offer a place for people to sit and talk–a place to belong.
We could greatly use your help! To volunteer your time, please contact us at [574] 235-0623 or [574] 287-7734.
Also, the following helpful items are needed: laundry soap, coffee and filters, toilet paper, bath towels, soap, shampoo, razors and shaving cream, women’s hygene products, and other toiletry items.
Most importantly, we ask for your prayers and your presence. We have a lot to celebrate, lots of friends and supporters to thank.
SBCW drop-in center to open
The South Bend Catholic Worker are planning to open their new drop-in center on Dec 2. The grand opening will begin with mass at 5pm at 744 South Main Street, South Bend, Indiana.
Mike Baxter in a dust cloud: The middle room is clean!
Catholic Workers and institutions
This review of Kristen E. Heyer’s Prophetic and Public starts by recalling a visit to the South Bend Catholic Worker community and a presentation by Margie Pfeil. It continues by referencing the academic work of SBCW member Mike Baxter.
Margie Pfeil and Mike Benedetti, Mike Baxter with an axe
I have a couple comments on the review; if I can get my hands on the book, I’ll comment on that, too.
Continue reading “Catholic Workers and institutions”
Orange County CW is #13!
Being #13 is not too bad, when you’re on The OC Weekly’s list of the county’s top 100 things.
No. 13: Christianity’s Dwight Smith
Whether you enjoy the fire and brimstone of Chuck Smith’s Calvary Chapel or its Spanish-language offshoot, the Templo Calvario (the largest Latino evangelical church in the United States)—or the gaudy Golgotha that is the Trinity Broadcasting Network headquarters; the Southern Baptist dressed in purpose known as Rick Warren’s Saddleback Church; the queer-friendly Metropolitan Community Church; the pedo-protecting ways of the Catholic Diocese of Orange, or the annual Harvest Crusade spectacle—Orange County hosts every manifestation of Christendom imaginable. We loves our Prince o’ Peace, and a lot of us will kick the ass of anybody who feels differently. But the man who best follows in the footsteps of the Nazarene remains the remarkable Dwight Smith, the man who runs a Catholic Worker from a large home in Santa Ana filled with the blessed of the Earth. Buy your way into heaven—give Dwight your extra pennies. Isaiah House, 316 S. Cypress Ave., Santa Ana, (714) 558-7478.Hey! Don’t forget Dwight Smith’s wife, Leia, you sexist pigs! (Rebecca Schoenkopf)
Winchell’s Donuts President Bob Zanolli, Catholic Worker Dwight Smith, and some homeless kids at a press event in 2003. Photo by Mike Benedetti.
Farewell to the South Bend Catholic Worker
I’m leaving South Bend tomorrow.
From the introduction to John Steinbeck’s Cannery Row:
Its inhabitants are, as the man once said, “whores, pimps, gamblers, and sons of bitches,” by which he meant Everybody. Had the man looked through another peephole he might have said, “Saints and angels and martyrs and holy men,” and he would have meant the same thing.
The Catholic Worker community: Margie Pfeil, Mike Baxter, Cinnamon Sarver, Brenna Cussen
From today’s reading (James 2:18):
Demonstrate your faith to me without works,
and I will demonstrate my faith to you from my works.
The South Bend Catholic Worker has a website
The South Bend Catholic Worker community now has a website. I’m very happy with the photo I took for it.
Paula Xenopus is now blogging her SBCW adventures at The Walnut Picker. She even blogged the hiking talk I gave Friday night. Thanks to all the Notre Dame students and Sierra Club members who showed up and packed the Catholic Worker’s living room.
You can also follow the SBCW at Flickr and Pie and Coffee.
Portland Catholic Worker
I went down to the Portland Catholic Worker’s Dorothy Day House this weekend, where I met Lisa Hughes and Father Jim Stephens. I was pleased to note it’s a vegetarian household.
The community is still going strong after two years, and seems to have a nice mix of activism and serving the poor.
In 2003, when I told Catholic Worker types I was from Worcester, they often asked, “Do you know Scott and Claire?” In 2005 and 2006, the number one question has been, “Do you know Christine Lavallee?” Lisa was the latest to ask.
Fr. Jim Stephens and Lisa Hughes in front of Dorothy Day House, Portland, Oregon.
[Portland Catholic Worker: PO Box 11193, Portland OR 97211 / portlandcw@techforpeople.net]
Remembering Nagasaki in South Bend
About twenty people gathered at the Federal Building last night in South Bend, Indiana, to repent and pray on the 61st anniversary of the atomic bombing of Nagasaki, Japan.
Another, more secular, vigil was held in South Bend earlier in the day.
The group, most wearing black, held signs reading “From Nagasaki to Lebanon / Mourn the Dead.”
Pictured: Mike Schorsch. Photo by Mike Benedetti. More photos.
The event was sponsored by the South Bend Catholic Worker and the Catholic Peace Fellowship. It began with the reading of a meditation, reprinted below.
(The South Bend Tribune covered this event. Last year when the Worcester Telegram & Gazette saw fit to cover a similar event in Massachusetts, they saw fit to “balance” the coverage by interviewing a WWII-era man with a poor understanding of the facts. The Tribune, to its credit, did not do this.)