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Santiago, Chile, Sep 18, 2018 / 12:06 am (ACI Prensa).- Every Wednesday night, 87-year-old Elena Donaire goes out onto the streets of Santiago, Chile, to meet the homeless and attend to their needs.

For 40 years, Donaire has taken part in the “Street Route” of the Hogar de Cristo (Christ’s Home), an organization that includes numerous outreach programs and facilities to help the poor.

Donaire starts her evening by fixing sandwiches, boiling water and organizing the warm clothing that she will give to the people she encounters on the streets. When everything is ready, the volunteers leave in their van.

Donaire is often the first to get out of the van to begin serving. Many of the homeless people on the streets of Santiago know her and greet her by the affectionate title “Dear Mama.” The other volunteers call her by the nickname “Grandma.”

In an interview with the Archdiocese of Santiago’s communications office, Donaire explained that her mission has its origin in her friendship with Saint Alberto Hurtado.

Known in Chile as Padre Hurtado, the Jesuit priest, author and lawyer founded Christ’s Home, a network of homeless shelters that also included trade schools, rehabilitation centers, and other facilities to serve the poor.

He was beatified in 1994 by Pope John Paul II and canonized in 2005 by Pope Benedict XVI.

Before Hurtado died in 1952, Donaire said she had “promised him to continue serving the people just as he did.”

“That’s the biggest reason I have to continue helping – it’s a joy for me,” Donaire said. “I am going out on the street until he calls me from above. I know that if he were alive, he would be here on the street helping along with me, I would like to be at his side.”

Remembering the Jesuit saint, Donaire said that “he didn’t smile a lot, but when it was an occasion for smiling, he was always there with us. He enjoyed sharing with the people, especially the children, he treated them with such love and affection that it still moves me to this day to remember those moments. I have never met a person as good and committed as he was.”

For Donaire, who lives alone in a small house and works selling clothes in a street market, “It doesn’t matter if it’s raining, or cold, there are no excuses for not going out on Wednesdays.”

“I anxiously wait for [the other volunteers] to come and pick me up for the simple reason that I want to be with these people. I like them and they make me happy. I know their stories and they tell me them.”

She acknowledged that she sometimes feels bad that she cannot do more to help the homeless people she encounters on the streets.

“I know I am going home to a house, I’m going to get a good night’s sleep, and I see that these people aren’t going to,” she said.

Still, she stressed the importance of doing what one can to help those in need.

“Help your brothers on the street,” she encouraged. “Many times, it’s enough just to talk with them, to listen to them, to find out how they are doing. I assure you that [they] feel happier just to share their troubles with someone. We all have commitments or things to do, but making an effort doesn’t cost anything.”

This article was originally published by our sister agency, ACI Prensa. It has been translated and adapted by CNA.

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San Rafael, Argentina, Jan 12, 2021 / 07:01 pm (CNA).- A group of Catholic women in the Diocese of San Rafael have launched a campaign to adopt the seminarians affected by the closure of the local seminary.

The campaign was launched by the association… […]

Santo Domingo, Ecuador, Dec 21, 2019 / 04:15 pm (CNA).- A group of religious sisters in Santo Domingo, Ecuador has installed the country’s first baby drop-off box, as an alternative to abortion for mothers who find themselves unable to care for their newborns.

The Missionary Benedictine inaugurated the country’s first “Cradle of Life” baby drop-off box on Dec. 10 in Santo Domingo. The box is located in the exterior wall of their Happy Valley Home, a temporary shelter providing foster care for at-risk girls and adolescents.

The sisters will support babies left in the box for up to three months. If the mother wishes to come back for the baby, she can also receive support from the Happy Valley Home. If the mother does not return after three months, the baby will be given up for adoption.

Sister Carmela Ewa Pilarska, a member of the home’s leadership team, said the project hopes to respond to cases of abandoned infants, such as those found occasionally in cardboard boxes or abandoned houses.

“We would like to be the voice for so many newborns who struggled to survive, and we’re speaking up for those newborns who didn’t have the same fate,” she said at a presentation of the “Cradle of Life” project.

Inside the drop-off box is a bassinet and a letter assuring mothers that their babies will be cared for with love and medical attention.

“We don’t know what happened in your life that you’re making this decision, and we’re not judging it,” the letter says.

Women can leave their babies safely and anonymously in the box. Once the door to the box is closed from the outside, it cannot be reopened, thus ensuring the baby’s safety. An alarm sounds inside the home, alerting the personnel of the baby’s arrival.

“After waiting a short interval to protect the anonymity of the person leaving the baby, the inner door is opened, the baby is retrieved and immediately given the necessary care,” Sister Pilarska explained.

“Every life is a gift. Mother Teresa of Kolkata said that children are like stars, there’s never too many,” she stressed.

The “Cradle for Life” initiative seeks to provide an alternative to abortions and follows in the footsteps of similar initiatives created in the United States and Europe. Notable efforts include Germany with 99 baby drop-off boxes, Poland with 45, the Czech Republic with 44, Hungary with 26 and Italy with eight. Such boxes are also present in Belgium, Switzerland, Canada, Malaysia and Japan, according to the Missionary Benedictine Sisters.

The sisters’ order was founded in Biala Cerkiew, Poland, in 1917 by Mother Jadwiga Josefa Kulesza, a cloistered Benedictine nun. Her goal was to help poor, abandoned, and homeless children, and she opened an orphanage after World War I.

The order currently has 280 sisters serving the needs of children in Poland, Ukraine, the United States, Brazil and Ecuador.

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