Jesuit Father Bill Johnson was in the Dominican Republic when the earthquake struck Haiti on January 12. Fr. Johnson is the director for pastoral care at the Institute of Latin American Concern (ILAC) of Creighton University located just outside of Santiago. ILAC is a Catholic, Ignatian-inspired, collaborative health care and educational organization offering service-learning and immersion experience opportunities in dental, medical, nursing, pharmacy, law, physical therapy and occupational therapy for undergraduate and high school students, and also to faculty-led groups, medical/surgical teams and other colleges in the rural Dominican Republic.

When the call went out for help in the days after the earthquake, Johnson answered it by offering his services as a translator and as a helper to the Creighton medical team assembled to come to Haiti to provide emergency medical care to the wounded and critically injured.

Jesuit Fr. Bill Johnson (center) poses with Jim Jalovec (right) and John Ward (left) in front of Jalovec's helicopter as they deliver supplies during relief efforts in Haiti.

Johnson experienced another tragedy in the days that followed the earthquake when his good friend, Jim Jalovec, was killed while providing help during the Haiti relief efforts. Jalovec had phoned Johnson immediately after the earthquake in Haiti to offer the services of his helicopter in the relief efforts. Good Samaritan Hospital in Jimaní, Dominican Republic, where Johnson and Creighton University’s medical teams were working, invited Jalovec and his pilot, John Ward, to come and fly doctors and medicine into Haiti. Three days into their rescue efforts, they died when their helicopter hit a mountain on the foggy night of Feb. 4. Johnson presided at Jalovec’s funeral in Chicago and Ward’s in Ft. Myers, Fla.

In memory of Jalovec, ILAC is selling “Show Your Goodness” t-shirts to help the ongoing relief efforts in Haiti. All profits will be sent to the Jesuit Refugee Service in Haiti to help children suffering from the earthquake. The shirts can be purchased by visiting the showyourgoodness.com website.

Johnson shared his reflections with nationaljesuitnews.com on his time helping at Good Samaritan hospital in the days following the earthquake. You can read his reflections and see his photos by clicking below.

Padre, did you feel it?” asked the neighbor lady as I made my way around the running path at our grounds in the Dominican Republic that evening.

“Feel what?” I asked.

“The wave in the ground. And were you shaking the barbed wire fence?”she inquired.

I stopped my run and headed back into the Institute for Latin American Concern (ILAC) center where I was told the lights hanging from the ceiling in the entrance had been swaying considerably.

Then the news hit: a major earthquake had battered our neighbors in Haiti. It was Tuesday, Jan. 12, and preliminary reports said there were possibly thousands dead or dying and many more homeless. I was in disbelief. How could this happen less than 200 miles away in Port-au-Prince and we had no damage or people hurt in the Dominican Republic? It didn’t seem right or fair. But what could any of us do about it?

I had arrived in the Dominican Republic at the end of August to be director of pastoral care at Creighton University’s ILAC center in Santiago de los Caballeros, the country’s second largest city, situated in the middle of the Cibao Valley between two mountain ranges that traverse the island.

Because ILAC has been providing basic health care to the poor of the Dominican Republic since 1977, Creighton University Medical Center was in a unique position to respond to the tremendous needs of the earthquake victims. The next morning I received a phone call from Creighton’s Dr. Brian Loggie, professor of surgery, and, with the amazing cooperation and generosity of many individuals and institutions in Omaha, we had a well-supplied, nine-member health care team on the ground here at the ILAC center in Santiago.By Saturday evening we were preparing for the seven-hour bus ride to Good Samaritan Hospital on the Haitian frontier in the town of Jimaní, in the southwest corner of the Dominican Republic.

We arrived at Good Samaritan by mid-afternoon on Sunday and our team of surgeons, anesthetists, nurses and a pediatrician went right to work at the triage center where over 400 patients were lying everywhere waiting for care, most for broken bones and crushed limbs. Most operations those first days were amputations. Anesthesia, antibiotics and other medicines and supplies had been almost non-existent before we arrived. Indeed, amputations had been done without anesthesia before our arrival.

Our Creighton team tried to bring some order to what looked like the chaos of a war zone, even as
more patients arrived in the back of pick-ups, flatbed trucks, ambulances and cars. Most had come from in and around Port-au-Prince, some 40 miles to the west.

Monday morning began a week of 12-hour shifts and non-stop work. By mid-day Dr. Loggie had become in charge of the surgical area where our operating teams worked while the rest of our team selected the most critical patients for surgery and cared for wounds in the triage center on the other end of the grounds. Because of my fluency in Spanish and French, I was put in charge of the front doors of the surgical center to allow only those with clearance to enter. At times I was called in to the operating rooms to help communicate between the surgical teams and the patients. The Haitians were amazingly patient and appreciative. Often their cooperative spirit and even smiles showed their tremendous resilience and amazing dignity.

Each day brought new duties and special moments for me. I can still feel my guts wrench when on Monday afternoon a nurse approached me at the front door carrying a large black plastic bag and asked me where the morgue was. I’d seen some caskets on the side of the building and asked what was in the bag. He told me it was the arm of the man I’d just translated for. Later, a huge man who I’d helped communicate with by telling his lovely young wife that the doctors would have to amputate his leg, died during the operation. I was away from my post at the entrance to the operatory when he died but was asked to comfort the distraught wife when I returned.

I tried to pray with her in French but it didn’t come easily. The Creole the Haitians speak is quite different from Parisian French. However, a Haitian woman joined us and began singing religious songs in Creole as we held the wife. It was amazing how her breathing eased and body relaxed at the songs and caresses. The next morning I prayed with her again before she left to return to Haiti.

By mid-afternoon on Tuesday I stopped and realized that in the midst of the terrible suffering all around me I felt consolation. I had the thought that I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else. I was where I was meant to be: serving God’s suffering people. I was not happy but I was full of joy to be there. Service of God’s people is joy. I shared that with other members of the team after dinner that night and most felt the same joyful sense of meaning and purpose in their service. Indeed, we all lamented that it took such a tremendous human tragedy to get so many good people together to do such good work. People laughed when someone remarked that they’d normally be bickering among themselves at their jobs back in Omaha.

The remainder of the week was full of blessings and challenges. We were all deeply touched by the suffering
of the kids; so beautiful, eyes full of light, smiles that melt your heart, some orphaned. By Wednesday, we were able to arrange for our first helicopter evacuations of patients in need of special care. Over the following days and weeks many more patients were evacuated, many in helicopters from the U.S.S. Comfort, a thousand-bed hospital ship off the coast of Port au Prince, through the intervention of Creighton administrators and Senator Ben Nelson of Nebraska.

By Thursday, Good Samaritan was running efficiently and more than 80 operations were performed. Health teams from many other nations came and went, but our Creighton team, and several more that followed us, were stalwarts of the staffing. I was very proud of Creighton and of our country for such generous responses.

By Sunday, Jan. 24, we decided it was time for us to leave. We’d put in a tremendous week of service and helped the hospital get up and running. A new team had arrived from Creighton and other health professionals and supplies were showing up daily. We would leave after Mass at noon. The Scripture readings fit perfectly: “Today is holy to the Lord your God. Do not be sad, and do not weep” (Nehemiah 8:9). “As the body is one though it has many parts, and all the parts of the body, though many, are one body, so also Christ” (1 Cor. 12). “Today this Scripture passage is fulfilled in your hearing” (Lk. 1:21). I preached having lived the readings that week with God’s people, Haitian and American and many others. We had lived the words. We experienced joy.

Praise God!

Jesuit Father General Adolfo Nicolas, right, visits the JRS Haiti tent offices in Port au Prince with Jesuit Fr. Wismith Lazard of JRS Haiti, left. Between the two men are Jesuit Fr. Kawas Francois, in white shirt, and Jesuit Fr. Daniel Leblond. Fr. Francois is president of the Jesuit Interprovincial Committee for the Reconstruction of Haiti and founding member of the National Committee for Reflection and Action, and Fr. LeBlond is the Provincial of French Canada. (Photo courtesy JRS/USA)

Jesuit Father General Adolfo Nicolas visited the Haitian capital Thursday to see the work Jesuits have been doing to as they accompany and serve the people of Haiti in the aftermath of the devastating January 12 earthquake.

Fr. Nicolas, the leader of the Society of Jesus, visited the Jesuit novitiate in the Tabarre neighborhood of Port au Prince, where he met with staff of Jesuit Refugee Service Haiti and Fe y Alegria. Both organizations have set up offices in tents on the novitiate grounds, and staff and volunteers are also living in tents on the grounds.

For many years Jesuit Refugee Service (JRS) has had a grassroots presence in Haiti and has provided humanitarian assistance to displaced Haitians in both the Dominican Republic and along the Haitian border. In addition, JRS has responded to the needs of Haitians following successive natural disasters, a food crisis, and repeated hurricanes.

While continuing to maintain its presence along the Northeastern border, JRS Haiti is focusing its current relief efforts in the Port-au-Prince area, working in seven camps that serve the needs of more than 21,000 displaced people in and around the capital. After visiting with staff and holding Mass, Fr. Nicolas met with and thanked JRS staff at the Automeca camp for people displaced by the earthquake in Port au Prince.

“The situation in Haiti is very difficult now. Before the earthquake, the situation was bad. Now, the situation is worse. We have a lot of unemployment, that’s a real problem. Many children can’t go to school, because so many schools collapsed in the earthquake-affected areas,” said Fr. Kawas Francois, S.J.

The Jesuit community in Haiti organized the National Committee for Reflection and Action (Cellule de Refexion et d’Action Nationale  – CRAN), composed of Jesuits and members of Haitian civil society who work together on an ongoing basis to accompany the Haitian people, their leaders, and the international community in their efforts to rebuild Haiti.

More than 80% of the population in the earthquake affected areas still live in camps. The situation is characterized by extremely high rates of unemployment and poor sanitation in the camps.

While continuing to maintain its presence along the Northeastern border, JRS Haiti is focusing its current relief efforts in the Port-au-Prince area, working in seven camps that serve the needs of more than 21,000 displaced people in and around the capital.

For more information on Jesuit Refugee Service’s work in Haiti, or how you can help, please visit: http://www.jrsusa.org

Jesuit Refugee Service has provided emergency relief in the form of food, medicine, tents and debris-removal tools to about 16,000 citizens in Port-au-Prince to aid their recovery from last week’s devastating earthquake. Additionally, in coordinated efforts with partner organizations in the Dominican Republic and Haiti, JRS has set up several locations throughout the countries to deliver aid to more people suffering from the effects of the earthquake in an efficient and organized manner. One of the JRS staging centers for earthquake relief in Haiti is the Jesuit novitiate in Port-au-Prince. Tents have been set up in the courtyard for medical volunteers to sleep in, and trucks unload their goods at the novitiate as well.

In this short video clip below, Jesuit Father Ken Gavin, national director of JRS/USA, speaks to the efforts of JRS as they move much needed supplies across the Dominican Republic/Haitian border into Port-au-Prince to their staging centers.

While the current needs are for the emergency resources for the earthquake victims, JRS will continue to be a presence in Haiti, long the poorest country in the Western hemisphere, with help in their long-term needs for stabilization, education and relief from widespread poverty.

National Jesuit News is urging people to give to the Jesuit organization Jesuit Refugee Service to help those in Haiti.

To support JRS/USA’s humanitarian response to the emergency needs of the Haitian people, please click here to be directed to their secure website and choose “Haiti Earthquake Relief Fund.”

Or you may send a check to:

Jesuit Refugee Service/USA
1016 16th Street NW Suite 500
Washington, DC 20036

Checks should be made payable to “Jesuit Refugee Service/USA.”
Please clearly note “Haiti Earthquake Relief” in the memo field on the check.

Jesuit Refugee Service in the Dominican Republic – working in coordination with JRS Haiti and other Jesuit relief efforts there – has established three centers in the Dominican Republic to coordinate the transfer of food, medicine and other emergency supplies to the people of Haiti.

The three operations centers are located in Santo Domingo, at the JRS Bono Center; Jimani, on the southern border between the DR and Haiti, the main port of entry because of its proximity to Port-au-Prince; and Puerto Tabar Principe, at the premises of the Jesuit novitiate there.

Jesuit Father Mario Serrano is helping to organize and process the supplies from the Dominican Republic into Haiti; he has made several trips into Haiti to assess needs there.

“We’re still in the process of responding to the emergency, offering a supportive presence, food and medicine. Little by little we are building the most effective methods for supplying timely and beneficial aid to the people,” said Fr. Serrano.

The supportive presence mentioned by Fr. Serrano embodies the concept of accompaniment, one of the core missions of JRS. “Our close and direct contact with people, our presence with them … allows us to understand their real needs,” says Jesuit Fr. Bernard Arputhasamy, Regional Director of Jesuit Refugee Service – Asia Pacific.

JRS has established several sites throughout the hardest hit areas of Haiti. Some of these, and the partners JRS is working with, are indicated on this map. http://bit.ly/86cUp7

“Emergency needs are many,” added Fr. Serrano. “We need bathrooms, tents and vehicles to transport the aid. In the long term we must think of where to concentrate our efforts. This should be education – we must help all the children of Haiti have good schools with good teachers,” said Fr. Serrano.

Education has long been a priority for Jesuit Refugee Service. Speaking on the occasion International Human Rights Day in 2008, JRS International Director Jesuit Fr. Peter Balleis said “Given educational opportunities, (children) have the potential to rebuild their lives, to help rebuild their communities and thus to strengthen and stabilize their countries for generations to come.”

After a series of natural disasters over the past 15 months, Haiti is entitled to some stabilization, and the children of Haiti deserve a future filled with hope and opportunity.

National Jesuit News is urging people to give to the Jesuit organization Jesuit Refugee Service to help those in Haiti.

To support JRS/USA’s humanitarian response to the emergency needs of the Haitian people, please click here to be directed to their secure website and choose “Haiti Earthquake Relief Fund.”

Or you may send a check to:

Jesuit Refugee Service/USA
1016 16th Street NW Suite 500
Washington, DC 20036

Checks should be made payable to “Jesuit Refugee Service/USA.”
Please clearly note “Haiti Earthquake Relief” in the memo field on the check.

The Jesuit Refugee Service office in Haiti has witnessed firsthand how little is available to address the overwhelming needs facing the Haitian population. Following the recent earthquake, hundreds of thousands of Haitians have been forced from their homes and  lack the most basic services and supplies. With  schools, hospitals road and bridges in ruins Haiti is in no position to offer support  to returnees.

Religious leaders who minister to Haitian communities throughout Haiti report continued water shortages, food shortages, an increasingly desperate population, and the inability of the Haitian government to fill the urgent needs of quake survivors.

Jesuit Fr. Kawas Francois, the Jesuit leader in Haiti, told us yesterday that “People lack everything: water, food, blankets and tents. They sleep in the streets. The dead are in the streets and under the rubble. Sanitary conditions are deteriorating.”

Congress established Temporary Protected Status to grant safety to foreign nationals in just such circumstances as those that currently face Haiti. The destruction caused by the earthquake in Haiti has made the safe return of Haitian nationals to their country impossible.

TPS will allow Haitians currently here to stay and work temporarily in the United States, as a response to the natural disasters that have recently plagued the country. Remittances from Haitians granted TPS will allow more than $1 billion in aid  to be sent to family members families still suffering on the island. As the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere, Haiti already depends significantly on remittances. By allowing some 30,000 Haitians to work and send remittances to 150,000 to 300,000 persons in Haiti, the despair of an entire country will be reduced.

National Jesuit News is urging people to give to the Jesuit organization Jesuit Refugee Service to help those in Haiti.

To support JRS/USA’s humanitarian response to the emergency needs of the Haitian people, please click here to be directed to their secure website and choose “Haiti Earthquake Relief Fund.”

Or you may send a check to:

Jesuit Refugee Service/USA
1016 16th Street NW Suite 500
Washington, DC 20036

Checks should be made payable to “Jesuit Refugee Service/USA.”
Please clearly note “Haiti Earthquake Relief” in the memo field on the check.

Two days after the powerful earthquake brought more devastation to the island of Haiti, eyewitness accounts from aid workers, Jesuits and others in the country are being shared.

…  just a quick note to let people know things are OK (here in Ounimanthe). Five minutes before the earthquake I was out on the street playing the fiddle for a group of kids that came and asked “if I could come out and play?”  I was in the house when the quake began and I ran outside when it happened. The aftershocks kept coming even into the evening. The power is out and we are currently getting power from the generator.

The capital, on the other side of the country, was hit hard. We have had no communication from the Jesuits in the capital because phones and cell phones are not working. I expect that the Fe y Alegria School, near the epicenter, probably was hit hard.

- Jesuit Brother Jim Boynton
January 13, 2010

The worst news I received is the death of Archbishop Joseph Serge Miot – an important man for the Church in Haiti.  I wrote to … (a colleague at) Radio Soleil, but didn’t get a response. … He must be very affected by the death of his bishop. I don’t know what to say.

- Jesuit Fr. Pierre Bélanger
Coordonnateur international – Réseau Étoile – Haïti
January 13, 2010

The situation is very serious.

Even though the Ouanaminthe and the Northeast area have not been greatly affected we still feel the aftershocks here. There are thousands of dead bodies currently on the streets of Port-au-Prince. More than 60 percent of the houses have collapsed in the metropolitan area of Port-au-Prince. The National Palace, the main building offices of the State, schools and institutions that belong to the Catholic Church no longer exist. Residences of religious, the roof of the Cathedral of Port-au-Prince, the Archbishop’s house etc.; all have collapsed. The body of the Archbishop of Port-au-Prince was found under the rubble.

Supermarkets, banks, trade houses, radio and television stations, hospitals … all have collapsed. The administrator of the General Hospital, the largest health institution in the capital, said it collapsed with many patients already inside and while many wounded were being brought in. People spent the night in the streets and in the open for fear of new collapses following the earthquake. Throughout the night and even this morning  there have been many aftershocks.

This morning: UN headquarters in Bourdon collapsed and left 11 dead; among whom are eight Brazilians and three Chinese. A population of 2.5 million in the city of Port-au-Prince is in the state of shock. It will be days before they can get an exact death toll; already there are thousands counted dead.

- Jesuit Father Perard C. Monestime
January 13, 2010

A Port-au-Prince neighborhood is a mass of ruined homes and lives after an earthquake devastated
much of Haiti, January 12, 2009. (UN photo by Logan Abassi)

We are in Canape Vert with Jesuit Fr. Kawas (the Jesuit Superior for Haiti). We visited the Jesuit novitiate in Tabare and later CRS in Delma. The latter is prepared to receive our assistance (water, ready to eat canned food, medicines, hygiene kits, tents). They will receive it in their stores of distribution.

We have not yet reached the most affected parts of the country and yet what we’ve seen already is disastrous. Many are dead, many have been placed in mass graves. Many others are still under the rubble. After coordinating actions with Kawas we are continuing to the center Port-au-Prince, then on to Carrefour and Cite Soleil. Fr. Kawas tells us these places are those that were most affected by the earthquake.

What is clear is that machinery to rescue people under rubble are not seen. We have seen many people in small camps, covered with sheets. Tents are needed urgently.

Most of all it is water that is needed now…. A water unit has been brought from the Dominican border for that purpose. Portable toilets will certainly be needed. The hospitals are crowded out of medicine and short of staff. Luckily it’s not raining, we pray to God no rain falls ….

- Mario Serrano, Director of JRS – Dominican Republic, who is leading a team into the earthquake devastated areas of Haiti.
January 14, 2010

National Jesuit News is urging people to give to the Jesuit organization Jesuit Refugee Service to help those in Haiti.

To support JRS/USA’s humanitarian response to the emergency needs of the Haitian people, please click here to be directed to their secure website and choose “Haiti Earthquake Relief Fund.”

Or you may send a check to:

Jesuit Refugee Service/USA
1016 16th Street NW Suite 500
Washington, DC 20036

Checks should be made payable to “Jesuit Refugee Service/USA.”
Please clearly note “Haiti Earthquake Relief” in the memo field on the check.

For many years Jesuit Refugee Service has had a grassroots presence in Haiti and has provided humanitarian assistance to displaced Haitians in both the Dominican Republic and along the Haitian border. In addition, JRS has responded to the needs of Haitians following successive natural disasters, a food crisis, and repeated hurricanes.

Speaking at the Vatican today, Pope Benedict XVI said “I appeal to the generosity of all people so that these brothers and sisters of ours who are experiencing a moment of need and suffering may not lack our concrete solidarity and the effective support of the international community. The Catholic Church will not fail to move immediately, through her charitable institutions, to meet the most immediate needs of the population.”

The mission of Jesuit Refugee Service/USA is to serve, accompany, and defend the rights of refugees and other forcibly displaced persons, witnessing to God’s presence in vulnerable and often forgotten people driven from their homes by conflict, natural disaster, economic injustice, or violation of their human rights.

As one of the ten geographic regions of the Jesuit Refugee Service, JRS/USA serves as the major refugee outreach arm of U.S. Jesuits and their institutional ministries, mobilizing their response to refugee situations in the U.S. and abroad. Through our advocacy and fund raising efforts, JRS/USA also provides support for the work of JRS throughout the world.

National Jesuit News is urging people to give to the Jesuit organization Jesuit Refugee Service to help those in Haiti.

To support JRS/USA’s humanitarian response to the emergency needs of the Haitian people, please click here to be directed to their secure website and choose “Haiti Earthquake Relief Fund.”

Or you may send a check to:

Jesuit Refugee Service/USA
1016 16th Street NW Suite 500
Washington, DC 20036

Checks should be made payable to “Jesuit Refugee Service/USA.”
Please clearly note “Haiti Earthquake Relief” in the memo field on the check.

Jesuit

You can read Fr. Gavin’s dispatches from Sri Lanka at the JRS/USA blog here.