Wednesday our parish treasurer made a rather heroic all day rescue trip to pull one of our members out of Metairie. A young man who works security, he had been in his apartment since the storm: no power, no food, litter water and living in 10 inches of toxic water. Refused to leave because his father would not evacuate.

He came to us at St. Luke's in shock. "Father, we've lost everything. Everything." These were the only excited words he could get out. One of the priests here ran him over to Our Lady of the Lake hospital for treatment.

Likely had developed strep throat and God only knows what else from the poisonous swill. I picked him back up around 11pm and put straight to bed. He slept until late afternoon Thursday when I made him some scrambled eggs, then back to sleep.

Only has the clothes on his back, all is lost in his apartment, job gone (company no longer exists), and no money in the bank. He also ranks among our many working poor who have no medical insurance or benefits of any kind. A fine young man, my faithful Sunday acolyte and all around helper.

Today, Friday, we spent much of the day trying to find long term housing for our teenage parishioner who was rescued from Memorial Hospital (across the street from our church) by canoe. She saw some terrible, terrible things during the siege there.

One of our great needs down the line will be counseling for post traumatic stress. A very bright girl from a dirt poor family, she was in a magnet school student taking a pre-pharmacy programme. Told us that the skills she learned during our recent summer mission trip to Chicago helped her survive and help others in the powerless, sweltering hospital.

Her mom cannot work because she has hepatitis C, her uncle -- for whom they care -- is severely autistic. Not making much progress, we stopped to pray. Within about ten minutes, old friends in Texas graciously agreed to take them in. God is good.

People here are excited about the FEMA vouchers, but good luck in trying to access the website or make phone contact. Hopeless. The docs, nurses and other medical personnel here have been the great heroes, along with the military and its leadership.

Volunteers at St. Luke's are busy today sorting the deluge of supplies coming in from all parts. We are most grateful. The baby items stay here, most everything else is taken to area shelters. In addition to the new mothers, we are also housing federal agents whose job it is to protect EPA workers. We are very concerned about what all it will take to make New Orleans inhabitable once again.

We're down to 16 parish families with whom we've been unable to make contact. One for whom we were terribly concerned, a middle aged man on dialysis, checked in yesterday. A big amen. He avoided the Superdome and made it to Tallahassee, Florida and the Red Cross.

There is still grave concern for my friend and parishioner Neal, a semi-indigent man living in the lower 9th. The shack where he was squatting went well under water.

Please pray we are reunited in this life. Thanks for all the relief packages and cash gifts. We are doing our best to take care of people here, eventually getting to long term housing, and assist families and individuals finding themselves from scattered from Texas to New Jersey.

We're so thankful for the housing offers around the country, but the most part that's still down the road. Location, triage and temporary shelter are the focus at present. Please bear with us. Imagine having a home, job and car and then finding yourself with absolutely nothing but maybe the clothes on your back. But we praise God for the gift of life. We live to fight another day. God is our refuge. We are refugees in the Lord.

Blessings from higher ground,

jerry+ op and all

www.stlukesbr.org email:
kramermission@yahoo.com