St. James on the Parkway builds vital bridges with Haitians

“We do whatever we can do to benefit others without seeing ourselves as helpers and the others as the helped. This is the spirit of the non-self.”–Thich Nhat Hanh

by ELAINE KLAASSEN
published July 7 2008

Children at St. James Episcopal Church on the Parkway create messages of love and friendship for their counterparts in Haiti. (Photo courtesy of the church)

Children’s vitamins are not available in Haiti. When humanitarian delegations go to Haiti they typically take as many vitamins as they can carry. For the past year, the people at St. James Episcopal Church on the Parkway have been raising money to send vitamins to children in Haiti. Last year, in November, they sent a volunteer from their congregation, Ruth Anne Olson, to Haiti with 100 pounds of children’s vitamins. A deep regard for the people and the culture compelled Olson to sign up for another trip, in November of ’08, but in the meantime she got a chance to go on July 9. She is on her way. The friendship is as important as the vitamins.

Olson, an intrepid volunteer at 68, is articulate and vibrant. Her efforts to learn Creole demonstrate her commitment. She has “sought out a U of M graduate student from Haiti who’s now teaching me Haitian Creole, so when I return to Haiti, I can show my respect for the people of Haiti in their own language.”

Her passion for this work has overcome any concerns she may have had about her age, health or endurance. Her passion has been contagious.

The enthusiasm generated by Olson and St. James on the Parkway for the vitamin project has created a network that extends far beyond the walls of the church.
Olson invited children outside of St. James to get involved. She gave presentations about Haiti, before and after her trip, to her grandson’s fourth grade class at Somerset Elementary School in West St. Paul. Olson said she was “awed by their curiosity and interest.” The kids were impressed to the extent that they (and their teachers) spent many after-school work sessions making jewelry, pottery and other crafts in order to raise money for St. James at their school’s spring carnival. Their labor paid off and they gathered $855.

A neighbor in Olson’s apartment building, who has no affiliation with St. James, or any other Christian church—because she’s Jewish—is very moved by the St. James/Haiti relationship and wants to be involved in a meaningful way.

The store manager at the Walgreens on 46th and Hiawatha, out of the many Walgreens managers that were approached, made it possible for St. James to purchase high-quality children’s vitamins at the lowest possible price. According to Olson, the manager didn’t hesitate for a moment to help. When St. James planned to send another volunteer, in March, he helped out again. He started to write out an order for more vitamins when he learned that Walgreens would no longer carry the store brand he had previously sold to the St. James group. So he went the second mile. Instead of saying, “Sorry, I can’t help this time,” he did research and came up with an alternative plan. (The March St. James trip didn’t take place because of food riots in Haiti, but the vitamins were delivered anyway, by other groups at a later date.)

St. James on the Parkway is connected to a larger network of Episcopal churches, in Edina, Linden Hills and St. Paul. In partnership with Episcopal parishes in Haiti, they work on community and economic development and education. Last November, Barbara Buehl, from St. Alban’s in Edina, was Olson’s mentor and traveling companion.

Olson’s love for Haiti is apparent in her writing— click here for a small part of her account.