A moment to reflect, with hope in our hearts

NPH at its best is about creating a world where our children have the opportunity to be the best they can be… a world where justice, love and mercy meet.

June 1, 2020

Today, the world that is being created around us is one where justice appears far and almost unachievable, grasping it seems further away than ever before. What can we do to take back the world and work to create that better place?

Perhaps the very fundamental teaching of our founder Father Bill Wasson sets the path straight. The simple truth of his teaching to the pequeños may be the answer. “Above all things we (NPH) emphasize the great need to love one another. The word that keeps us together is brotherhood (sisterhood), and every child knows that whatever he or she does against any person they do against their own brother and sister. We teach that the very worst sin is not being able to live as brothers and sisters.”

It is difficult to face the truth that we live in a country where more than 100,000 people have died of COVID-19 and millions of others are infected, certainly we could have done more than just count. A world where a man cries, “I can’t breathe,” calling for his mother and pleading for his life. His voice, joined by so many others who before have cried those words, has now become a choir — a lifeless, breathless choir. We now live in a world where a child of color lives in fear, a black man is afraid to jog, and people are quick to blame anyone of Asian descent for a disease. We cannot just allow this to be the new normal.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. once preached, “The arc of the moral universe is long but it bends toward justice.” Despite this long journey, Dr. King presents us with the hope that justice is achievable, and it does lay within our reach.

Isn’t addressing social injustice the very story of NPH? A homeless boy steals from the church, and the priest decides to dedicate his life to raising that child to have new opportunity and new direction. A decision that created a movement. A movement that Saint John Paul II said to Father Bill, “You have blessed the children’s lives far beyond what any material wealth could do for them; for you have given them love, hope, faith and care.” Isn’t that in fact the challenge for all of us who desire justice?

You and I are called therefore to be the story tellers; to tell the story of thousands of children who faced terrible injustice and ended up at NPH, the voice for George Floyd and others like him, the voice for all children of color, and the inequality all around us.

With your support of NPH and your prayers, you empower the simple message, “Above all things we emphasize the great need to love one another.” If we can but give power to those words, amazing things can happen. In fact “justice and fairness may flow like a river and never run dry.” (Amos 5:24)

Please stay safe and take care of each other.

Peace and goodness,
Frank Donaghue
President and Chief Executive Officer, NPH USA

Related Information:
• How Your Help Makes an Impact at NPH

• More News