By Thea Jarvis

Sheila Bissonnette, executive director of the metro Atlanta St. Vincent de Paul Society, administers a 600-person corps of volunteers who make up the Society in the archdiocese of Atlanta.

Once in awhile, she says, “I am blessed with having special cases come to my attention.”

One such case turned up this past spring, when a social worker from St. Joseph’s Hospital in Atlanta called St. Vincent’s to enlist help for a terminally ill woman wanting to see her youngest son, who was in a Florida prison.

Funds were needed to cover gas mileages, meals for two accompanying officers and food for the prisoner. The estimated cost came to far more than was available at St. Vincent’s.

“Our motto, ‘No act of charity is foreign to the society,’ kept going through my mind. Where else could someone go for such a unique request?” Ms. Bissonnette remembers asking herself.

The woman’s family had exhausted all possibilities. Of her six children, this youngest was her favorite. The rapidly spreading cancer meant that without outside help, she would die before saying goodbye to her son.

“We didn’t have the money, but the need was urgent,” said Ms. Bissonnette. “The money would come, somehow.”

Within hours, she recalled, a fellow Vincentian visited the office and delivered a donation in the amount of $2,500.

The following day was spent arranging transmission of funds between Atlanta and Florida. Differences in time zones, broken fax machines and harried social workers conspired to delay what needed to be a speedy transaction.” The only thing left was to pray the delivery (of money) would be made in time or that the mother would live another day in the knowledge that her son was coming to visit,” Ms. Bissonnette said.

Over the course of the day, she asked friends to pray for a miracle.

Because personal, one-to-one outreach is a cornerstone of the Society, Ms. Bissonnette decided to visit the family.

“I hesitated to do this because I worried that they would ask for more money,” she said. “Without money and quite possibly a funeral in the near future, I could see another request for funds coming.”

She headed for St. Joseph’s anyway.

When she arrived, she learned the young son had just left his mother’s bedside to return to Florida and prison.

According to the woman’s husband and other children, the visit had gone well. The mother had been awake and alert. She recognized her son and was able to tell him that she loved him. When the short visit was over and he had to leave, she had squeezed his fingers.

The rest of the family related that the visit was good for them, as well, and expressed gratitude to St. Vincent’s.

“I asked if there was anything else we could do for them, and they said they just wanted their wife and mother to get better,” said Ms. Bissonnette.

The shared the story of the youngest boy, explaining that this was the first time he had been in serious trouble.

“They said he was supposed to be up for parole, but because of a paperwork problem, it would be two more months before he could be considered,” she said. “One sister said how hard it was for her brother to return to prison again.”

Ms. Bissonnette recounted the miracle of the donated monies, knowing how frustrated the family had been in their dealings with administrative officials.

“I wanted to show them that somewhere someone had gone out of their way to make this happen,” she said. She then asked if the family wanted to pray.

“This request came out of the blue,” she laughed. “I don’t pray spontaneously!”

The prayer was fervent and drew tears and feelings that had long been bottled up inside.

“As I shared this story afterwards, I told a friend this was the ‘ideal or romantic’ experience of charity work. The people were helped, they were grateful and I was blessed,” said Ms. Bissonnette.

“Many times the help isn’t available, or it isn’t appreciated immediately, or no one’s heart is touched. But this day was different.”