Remarks of Jean Souffrant CCHD-USCCB Cardinal Bernardin New Leadership Award Recipient
November 11, 2001
First and foremost, let me just say how blessed and wonderful I feel standing here right now. This will be by far one of the most memorable nights of my life. Now, the question is
How did I end up here?
It all started with my mother, during my years growing up in Haiti. Just as a side note, when I told my mother that I was to be the recipient of this award, she could not have been more proud if I were to have told her I was entering the seminary. She was so happy that her son, her little boy, had kept the values that she instilled in him. For as far as I can remember, as young as five years old, my mother started taking me to church with her.
As I got older, church became a regular part of my life. When I was 13, I left Haiti for America to come live with my father, my dad. Now this was the first time in my whole life I was meeting him face to face.
There were many thoughts and concerns patrolling my mind, one of them being "Will my father be taking me to church with him?" It turned out that he's the type of person who goes to church for funerals, weddings, and baptisms only. But through conversations with my mother, he discovered my love and admiration for church. Every Sunday he would drop me off and then pick me up after mass at Notre Dame d'Haiti Catholic Church in the Little Haiti neighborhood of Miami.
After a while, however, I started to lose interest. I guess in Haiti I knew everyone in the church and there were a number of young people that I could relate to. But being here in America, as much as I enjoyed some of the masses, I couldn't really relate to anyone. I couldn't communicate too well with the younger crowd, because they mostly spoke English. And because of my youth, I was excluded from the adult functions. Church then became a routine. I was going, but I really didn't want to go.
Anyhow, about two years down the line, one of the youth leaders approached me and asked if I wanted to be in a youth group. I was so excited that I said yes even before talking to my dad. But that wasn't the challenge, for my father was even happier because the leader of the group told him she would be taking me home after Sunday meetings. My challenge came during my first meeting. As happy as I was to be in the presence of other young people, I couldn't understand any of them because their primary LANGUAGE was English. But I was not about to let language barriers stop me from the one good thing that happened to me in the two years that I had been coming here. As the years progressed, I learned English and started fitting in with everyone else.
I later on met a man named Gerard Pean, who invited me to participate in a PACT Action Meeting, which was to be held in Tampa. Gerard is a lay leader at my parish, and he is also one of the community organizers for PACT. PACT, which has received several grants from the Catholic Campaign for Human Development, is a coalition of 25 churches throughout Miami working together for social justice, and Gerard Pean was the one who inspired me to get involved.
The Action meeting in Tampa was the first time that I came in contact with the way that PACT works. Everything was so well organized, that I thought the whole thing had been staged. I mean, from the sign-in sheet to getting everyone aboard the buses, to instructing the target what's to be responded of the questions asked, to celebrating the results, it's all done so beautifully and accurately. That's when I knew there was a different method to getting people to do what you need them to do.
Following that I attended the basic training offered to all PACT leaders. And a year later, I attended the advanced training. Having been to those trainings, I began to realize the role that PACT plays in my community. Additionally, the Renew 2000 process at my parish reinforced the importance of the church being involved in community issues.
When I came to this country ten years ago, not being able to speak English kept me from being able to accomplish many things. There are many times when I wasn't represented. When I could have been counted but I wasn't. My inability to speak English literally handicapped me. And today when I look around in my community, I see many "me's" in the people.
I feel particularly for the young people, although they don't need what I needed because they speak English, but they need PACT.
They need PACT to say to the Commissioner of Education, "Kids aren't learning to read properlyand the community needs you to do something about it."
They need PACT to say to the Mayor, the County Commissioners, and the Transit Officials: "We need more buses in our poorest neighborhoods of the cityand we need you officials to do something about it."
They need PACT to say to all of our elected officials in Miami-Dade: "We might be poor, but we are children of God and we deserve to be treated with respect. We deserve justice."
I remember one of the things that I learned from the advanced training that I attended was something called "The Prophetic Call." We are all called to be prophetsto denounce what is unjust and to proclaim justice. Through the prophet Ezekiel, God is calling out for someone to stand in the gap against injustice. PACT responds to that call, and I couldn't have been more proud to be a part of it all.
I would like to thank Aaron Dorfman for nominating me, CCHD, Father Vitillo, and Bishop Leibrecht for encouraging me to continue working for justice by giving me this award, Archbishop Favalora and Bishop Wenski from Miami for supporting the Haitian community and PACT's ministry of social justice, and my parents for being there for me.
In accepting this award, many thanks and congratulations to all the other nominees. For I may be standing here receiving this award, but the work that we do is the true reward. Thanks to you all, and God Bless.