On top of that challenge, the Bay Area is home to a rapidly growing immigrant population from a host of countries, whose members are often in need of day-to-day help simply to survive.

Catholic Charities

At the heart of this city's burgeoning demand for social services, ranging from housing and meals to legal assistance and education, is Catholic Charities San Francisco.

In order to affect the lives of its struggling constituents in a meaningful way, the agency has had to dramatically change in some ways.

It's changed the way it manages and delivers a constellation of assistance programmes through its 500 employees and $60- to $90-million annual budget, among the largest in the Catholic Charities USA network.

Training programme

Rising to help meet that formidable challenge to Catholic Charities, not just in San Francisco but in its agencies across the country, is a new nonprofit executive management training programme.

As of this spring, the programme will have brought top-tier business school knowledge and skills to local leaders at nearly all of Catholic Charities' 167 offices.

The programme gives Catholic Charities the opportunity to break from more than a century of entrenched management rules and regulations.

This then enables the nation's largest purveyor of social services to move a new business model characterised by best practices, strategic thinking and, above all, the relentless need for change that nearly every office is now facing.

"The executive-level training enabled me to develop a robust theory of change across our agency, and that's helped us to ensure the sustainability of key assistance programs and services," said Ellen Hammerle, chief executive officer of Catholic Charities San Francisco.

One programme that has already benefited, she points out, is the Center for Immigration, Legal and Support Services.

Traditionally beset by fiscal challenges, that center revamped the structure of its extensive legal services programme to make it more of a business model than a social services model.

The process they use to do this was guided by the innovative thinking and strategic tools that Dr. Hammerle acquired from her nonprofit management training.

The need for advanced, C.E.O.-caliber education is echoed across the Catholic Charities network.

"We have amazing leaders in our Catholic Charities offices, but many don't have the background of running what amounts to an independent business and don't have the financial resources to get that in-depth training," explains Anthony Sciacca.

He's the executive vice president and chief development officer of Catholic Charities USA.

"Our C.E.O.s are thrilled that a course of this magnitude is being offered to them, and at the conclusion, they can't wait to take what they have learned back to their respective organizations for implementation."

Putting the ‘Theory of Change' to Work

Catholic Charities in Green Bay, Wis., is closely following that playbook.

It is deploying theory of change tools that Karmen Lemke, director of Catholic Charities in the Diocese of Green Bay, gleaned from her advanced business training.

These tools aim to target humanitarian services that will have the greatest impact on resource-poor communities in some 16 mostly rural counties of Northeast Wisconsin.

"It's here, beyond the borders of Green Bay, where some of the greatest social needs exist, and where our unique presence can fulfill what God is calling on us to do to serve those most in need," said Ms. Lemke.

She manages a staff of 35 and an annual budget between $4.5 million and $5 million.

"My academic training is helping us to connect our goals with our mission and to draw on data-driven information and resources wherever possible to make those important decisions.

"It will also be helpful in measuring and communicating the impact of our outreach activities."

Laura Deitrick, director of the Nonprofit Institute at the University of San Diego, which designed and delivers the certificate-granting program, underscores its ability to change the mindset of participants.

"These leaders are running very successful organisations, but a programme like this is designed to move their thinking to a more strategic level, which could mean greater engagement with their boards, for example.

"It could also mean for instance, figuring out what measurable outcomes they want to achieve in the community and then writing a budget that will get them there," Dr. Deitrick said. Read more

• Randy Young is a freelance writer in New Jersey.

"We really, really wanted it to feel like a fun little boutique, like a place where you can have some dignity in picking out the things that you want," Tanya Singh, who began the ministry, told The Pillar.

Mary's Closet is an outreach of St Petronille Parish in Glen Ellyn, Illinois. Serving mostly single mothers, some of whom lack housing, it first opened its doors in February 2022.

The idea was a response to the need in the St Petronille community.

Read More

The report says each high cost client costs at least $500,000 in lifetime services, costing taxpayers $6.5 billion in total.

Council of Christian Social Services director Trevor McGlinchey says he supports the principle of handing control of budgets for needy clients to local communities, but he warns that focusing purely on the 10,000 needy individuals or nuclear families misses the need to build the strength of the wider whanau and community around them.

Auckland City Missioner Dame Diane Robertson says the report proposes new layers of bureaucracy and "navigators" to coordinate different services, when the best answer would be to provide a single integrated service for each client in need.

She says mission research with 100 needy families last year found that families did actually understand the system and did not need "navigators". They simply needed help with the basics of adequate food, housing and income so that they had time and energy to tackle other issues such as mental health or addictions.

"We need to rethink," she says.

The new report is part of a package of Government initiatives aimed at encouraging schools, doctors and other social services to work together to help families with complex issues such as family violence and addictions.

Other initiatives include children's teams, which already allocate a "lead professional" to coordinate services for families with children, and Whanau Ora, which appoints "navigators" to help families develop whanau plans and bring in services to help them achieve those plans.

Sources

• nzherald.co.nz
• Image: screen shot assets.documentcloud.org

In Christchurch it has six churches (Belfast, Aranui, Sydenham, Linwood, Moorhouse Ave and Hornby) plus Family Stores selling secondhand items.

Less well known might be the array of social services it runs: food banks, supported accommodation, back-to-work training courses, budgeting advice, alcohol, drug and gambling addiction programmes and a van to feed sex workers and the homeless.

Its members and volunteers do advocacy work in courts and prisons, counselling and catering in welfare centres. It is a registered charity and stays afloat through donations, its annual Red Shield appeal, Family Stores' profits and winning contracts for service (the most recent being the government's $5 million gambling prevention contract). Continue reading

The church has long been criticized as "too dogmatic." Demands are constantly made that it change its 2,000-year-old teachings on marriage, family, sexuality, morality and other matters related to the truth about human beings. But even if others do not agree, the church understands that what it proclaims is revealed truth — the Word of God. The church's teachings are timeless. They cannot be changed, even though adherence may be upsetting to some. That the church is built on a rock with fixed beliefs is a positive feature, both because it can withstand the shifting winds of public opinion and because of the cherished content of our faith itself, which fosters love among Catholics and non-Catholics alike.

Although these precepts may be misunderstood by many today, the fundamental vocation of the Catholic Church is to provide the witness of love and truth to the world, including offering the voice of an informed conscience. Catholics are taught to respect the fundamental, inherent dignity of every person, each made in the image of God, and to work to establish a just society. The church teaches that it is our obligation to manifest love of neighbor, to provide charitable service to others, and to promote truth, genuine freedom and authentic humanism. We work for the poor, the oppressed and the suffering, because that is what our faith teaches we must do. There is thus a positive side to being dogmatic: The teachings and works of the church advance the common good throughout civil society. Just as our dogma is constant, so is the work it commands.

The Archdiocese of Washington is the largest nongovernmental provider of social services in our area: Seventy-five programs in 48 locations offer assistance to whoever needs it, regardless of religion, race, gender, nationality or sexual orientation. Each year, more than 100,000 people in the Washington area rely on Catholic charitable organizations for housing, food, job training, immigration assistance, legal aid, dental care, mental health care, lifespan services for those with disabilities and their families and prenatal care and assistance for vulnerable pregnant women and unwed mothers. Continue reading

Sources

• Cardinal Donald Wuerl in The Washington Post
• Image: Catholic Faith in Action

Cardinal Donald Wuerl is archbishop of Washington.