Catholic chaplains offer comfort to hurricane victims

Published: 2005-09-28

MILWAUKEE (CNS) -- Catholic hurricane relief efforts in the Gulf Coast have included spiritual comfort, too. About 10 members of the Milwaukee-based National Association of Catholic Chaplains have been among the spiritual care providers dispatched to hurricane survivors. The association and other spiritual care groups have been working with the American Red Cross and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to place chaplains in the affected areas. According to a Sept. 22 release from the association, the chaplains' work has taken them everywhere. Some have been deployed to shelters where they have consoled and listened to victims who may have lost everything in the storm. Others, working in flooded New Orleans, had the grim task of praying over the bodies of victims as recovery teams combed the streets and buildings. "It was clearly an overwhelming task," said chaplain Tim Serban, an association member from Everett, Wash.

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