Archbishop Lucas on CRS in Uganda: Good work for families, community

A family in Uganda making enough money with help from Catholic Relief Services (CRS) to send their children to school and over several years build a larger, more comfortable house.

Hundreds of thousands of people from war-ravaged South Sudan finding help and safe haven in Ugandan refugee camps supported by CRS and other agencies.

Young wives and mothers learning, with the relief agency’s assistance, to make and find local markets for dresses, sandals, cookies and other goods.

These were among the experiences Archbishop George J. Lucas shared with the Catholic Voice after a July 16-23 trip to Uganda that included CRS president and CEO Sean Callahan and Bishop Gregory J. Mansour, CRS board chairman and bishop of the Eparchy of Saint Maron of Brooklyn.

“I was privileged to see up close some of what they do in Uganda,” Archbishop Lucas said of his tour with CRS, the U.S bishops’ overseas emergency and economic development arm.

“I was very impressed with the caliber of the people doing the work and what was being received by the beneficiaries,” said the archbishop, whose six years of service on the CRS board ends in December.

The trip also was an important reminder that donations of any size to the agency go a long way toward building strong families and communities, the archbishop said.