Where 50 cents makes a big difference

Some of my friends just returned from a trip to El Salvador and I’m intrigued by some of the stories they told.

I’m sharing with you some of what intrigued me.

The trip wasn’t your typical travel somewhere to sightsee. It was 25 people working every minute of the day to build homes for the poor.

Here’s the first interesting thing. The youngest of the volunteers was 55, next youngest 68. Most were in their mid-to-late seventies and at least one was 83. In my mind, it’s rather amazing they could put in long hours laboring in intense heat.

They went to Santa Ana to volunteer with Unbound, a lay Catholic organization that helps 300,000 people of all faiths in 30 countries. They do that primarily through sponsors who donate $36 a month to help a child or ailing elder.

You heard the story about one person lighting a candle in the darkness, right?

It’s just one person. Just one candle.

But if that person lights a candle for someone else and if that pattern continues, soon we have a house or a community blazing with light.

That’s exactly how my friends got to El Salvador for their home building mission.

One couple went to El Salvador and decided to help. They convinced another couple to go on the next trip there. That couple recruited 25 more volunteers.

My friend Charlotte was the guiding force behind that trip. But before she lifted a finger to help Unbound she flew to El Salvador to check out what they did there. Then she flew to Unbound’s headquarters in Kansas.

“I wanted to make sure they did what they said they did,” said my cautious friend.

She was happy to learn the charity spends 92.6 percent of its donations to support its programs.

One of the things I love about Charlotte is how careful she is in vetting every person and every project she decides to help.

Actually, there’s a lot I love about Charlotte. She’s softspoken with a quiet demeanor. Yet she can be a force of nature when she believes in a cause. And she believes fervently in the Gospel’s message to help the poor.

Joining her on that trip was my close friend Fran. When Fran saw how Unbound transformed the lives of poor families, she decided to sponsor one child.

“But then I had this thought. Most of us give out of our excess. What if we made giving a sacrifice by giving up something in our lives?” she said.

Fran doesn’t have much money but she lives a joyful, frugal life, thankful for every little blessing. She’s especially thankful for her backyard garden that allows her to grow much of her food.

You’ll never see Fran spending money on frivolous stuff, and to her, if it’s not essential to living, it’s all frivolous. The one so called “excess” she allows herself is going to bingo twice a month.

Now, here’s what blew me away. After Fran saw the poor children in El Salvador, she decided to sacrifice her bingo nights to sponsor a second child.

I asked both Fran and Charlotte the same question. Why El Salvador? Don’t we have enough people here in the states that need help? Don’t we have enough hurting people in our own communities?

“We all also give generously to local charities,” said Charlotte. “But $36 can’t change lives of an entire family here like it does in El Salvador. That $36 can help an entire family better survive.”

Both Charlotte and Fran spend much of their time helping the poor in our community. Fran brings her gift of encouragement to those enrolled in the Bridges Out Poverty program she helps run. Charlotte volunteers every day with St.Vincent DePaul.

So, yes, they do help the poor at a local level as well as in El Salvador.

“A 16- by-16 home with cement floors is considered palatial by the families who live in the homes we build,” explained Charlotte.

Grateful parents with five children will live in one of those homes. It staggers my mind to think about that. I guess I’ll never complain again about my lack of closet space.

“You can’t imagine what those homes meant to them. Mothers cried with happiness from the time our truck arrived. We had plenty of tears, too, as we heard their stories,” said Fran.

But what impressed the volunteers the most wasn’t the poverty they saw. It was the happiness.

“Those people are so incredibly happy all the time,” says Charlotte.

How can people that poor be happy all the time? How can those with so little say they thank God every day for all they have?

What I also find astonishing is how the mothers willingly give up some of their monthly $36 to help another family facing a crisis. When one child needed expensive medical treatment, mothers in the program each donated 50 cents to help.

I’m amazed at how those with so little share what little they have. Fifty cents makes a big difference to them.

I’m still chewing on all that I heard from my friends about their El Salvador project.

While I will donate to their next trip, I doubt I would have the stamina to go along.

But who knows what we will be called to do.

Contact Pattie Mihalik at newsgirl@comcast.net.