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Volunteer recalls memorable folks

MENASHA -- What kind of help is God likely to send when your freezer, full of food, breaks down?

That question was on the mind of a Sister of Charity serving in the Dominican Republic one morning when she knelt to pray, Nancy Bourassa told the Orville Janssen Forum last week at Mt. Tabor Retreat Center.

This Sister of Charity -- the order Mother Teresa founded -- received the freezer the day before. It contained enough food to feed the people she worked with for two or three months. But when she got up that morning, the freezer wasn't working, said Bourassa, who has served as a volunteer in missions on two continents.

How was she going to use all the food in a couple days if the freezer couldn't be fixed, she wondered. She was still kneeling when a man knocked on her door -- an electrical engineer -- who not only fixed her freezer, he also gave her a check for $10,000 from a foundation.

Bourassa, a radiologic technologist at St. Elizabeth Hospital of Appleton, shared memories of people who touched her life from her 11 trips to the Dominican Republic, in addition to trips to Mexico, Peru and various African nations.

For example, there was the 50-year-old woman she met in a Tanzanian hospital. The woman sat on her bed, her face covered with a large bandage.

When Bourassa pulled the bandage back, the woman's face "fell an inch and a half," she said. Her sons had cut her just below the eyes and across her cheek bones because they considered her a witch who had cursed them with bad luck.

The woman had walked 100 miles to the 800-bed hospital. After discharge, she would have no place to go and would have to beg.

Bourassa said she used the $30 in shillings she planned to change back into American currency to help the woman get her own room with a closet in a charity home and her own set of dishes.

Bourassa also talked about:

• Romero, a builder she met while helping Habitat for Humanity in Mexico build adobe houses, each with a living room, kitchen, bedroom and bath. He said he became involved to help a friend who was receiving a home. His service, he said, "does not feed my pocket; it feeds my heart."

• Francisca, a teen she met in a girls' school in Lima, Peru, who was crying for joy because her family of 13 lived in three rooms and sent $10 a month so she could go to school. At the school, there were five to a room, and she felt fortunate.

• A priest serving in Africa who was called to hear the last confession of a woman dying from AIDS. When he got to her home, he found her wrapped in a pile of rags in a corner. When he looked at her, he saw large, brown eyes and skin pulled tightly across her face.

After she confessed, that face was beautiful, Bourassa said. The woman told the priest, "I will be in heaven before you, but I will save you a place."

Bourassa said her goal is to serve full-time in the missions for a couple years.