Annette Williams does math with teaching assistant Toni Rizzuoto at the Bishop Perry Center on Tuesday, July 8.
Julia Kumari Drapkin
By Sheila Stroup, The Times-Picayune
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on July 12, 2014 at 2:53 PM
The Bishop Perry Center opened in August 2013 to minister to the spiritual and physical needs of people in Faubourg Marigny and nearby neighborhoods. It offers GED tutoring, a computer literacy class, and lessons in resume writing and job interviewing. You can get free clothing and food here. There is Mass at noon every weekday in the small chapel, and a Primary Care Clinic every Friday afternoon.
And the center is for all people, regardless of their backgrounds or beliefs.
"Everyone is welcome here. There is no entrance test," the Rev. William Maestri says.
Maestri directs the center, and he came up with the idea for it when the three-story building at 1941 Dauphine St. became available at the end of 2012.
"This was a very wonderful setting, close to the Bywater and the French Quarter, and we had an increasing awareness of the homeless, the poor, and those in need in our neighborhood," he says.
It is an extension of St. Louis Cathedral, and its mission fits in closely with the vision of Pope Francis.
"This is the first time the Archdiocese has been directly involved with a community outreach program," Maestri says.
I can't stop smiling as he gives me a tour of the center, knowing it is bringing help and hope to the neighborhood.
The last time I was in this building, I was feeling downhearted because the Bishop Perry Middle School for Boys was closing. After Hurricane Katrina, many of its students and donors were scattered across the country, and there wasn't enough money to keep it going. It was an exemplary free Catholic school for African-American boys in grades 5-8, a place run on a tiny budget by an amazing group of teachers and staff members. It was for the neediest of New Orleans' sons, and they thrived in the warm and loving environment.
Once when I was visiting, I asked a classroom of fifth-graders what they liked best about the school. They told me about their favorite classes, their friends, their afterschool activities. But the answer that stuck with me came from a small boy, who said quietly, "They don't have fighting here. I feel safe."
The school and the new center were both named for Bishop Harold R. Perry, the first modern African-American bishop in the United States. Perry was ordained in 1965 and served at Our Lady of Lourdes in New Orleans.
"Bishop Perry was a man of quiet strength who was gifted with the ability to bring together people with diverse backgrounds for the common good," Maestri says.
I look at Maestri's hibiscus plants in bloom in the front garden, and remember the garden Bishop Perry students planted in the spring of 2006 after they learned the school they loved would close at the end of the summer session. They named their patch of colorful annuals "The Garden of Hope."
Now, the new center is blossoming along with the hibiscus flowers. Sunday, July 6, marked the first concert in the Summer Sunday Musical series, "Around the World Through Music," which celebrates the music heritage of New Orleans. This weekend, Hispanic and African-American music will be featured in the 2 p.m. concert, and the following two Sundays will highlight Celtic and Italian traditions.
Beginning Sunday, July 20, at 10 a.m., professional hairstylists from the Paul Mitchell Studio will cut and style hair for men, women and children of all races and ethnicities.
"It will be an ongoing thing, and it's free. It's goes along with our programs to help people who've been out of work and want to interview for jobs," Rosemary James says.
James and her husband, Joe DeSalvo -- founders of the Faulkner Society and owners of Faulkner House Books -- are among the many "friends of the center."
"Their wisdom, support and energy have been invaluable," Maestri says.
Thanks to them and other friends of the center, there soon will be a lending library on the third floor. It will be dedicated on July 27.
"I wanted to have a library, and George Jeansonne, who was a librarian, secured the financing for the software to run it," Maestri says. "Joe and Rosemary are donating books, and so is a lady in Maryland."
It will have a reading room, computers and free wi-fi. A book club will meet monthly at the library. The library also will have a laminating machine where patrons can get free photo identification cards. That has been a frequent request.
"You need to have a photo ID for everything now, even to buy a bus ticket," James says.
Besides Maestri, the center has only one other staff member -- manager of operations Rae Jean Carroll.
"Without Rae Jean the center could not grow," Maestri says. "It's her commitment and love for the community, and her caring for the people who come here. She's a true gift to the center and to the Archdiocese."
Volunteers have been the backbone of the Bishop Perry Center from the beginning. They've helped with cleaning and organizing, donating equipment and furnishings, and doing whatever else needs doing.
"We've really been very blessed with the generosity of their time and talents," Maestri says. "When people understand there are others in need, they respond with generous hearts."
Sue Ireland, an artist who lives across the street, created an eye-catching gift on the back wall outside the center: a mural illustrating the storied past of the property.
"She was out here for eight months working on it," Maestri says.
In the mid-1800s, Marie Couvent, a free woman of color, willed the land to the Catholic church for a school for black orphans. After the original building was destroyed by a hurricane in 1915, it was rebuilt and turned over to Holy Redeemer Parish. Ernest "Dutch" Morial, New Orleans' first black mayor, attended elementary school there. In 1956, when the old structure was condemned, the three-story building replaced it.
One thing I love about the mural is the way Ireland preserved elements from two previous murals.
One section was done by young women who attended the alternative Catholic school for pregnant teenagers housed in the building between 2006 and 2012. It is a lovely depiction of the students' babies looking up at St. Gerard Majella, the patron of expectant mothers and namesake of the school.
The second was painted by students at Bishop Perry Middle School a few months before Hurricane Katrina. It shows a confident young black man, head raised, books in hand, climbing a stairway above the New Orleans skyline while a white dove leads the way.
In 2005, when I saw that mural behind the middle school and met the students who created it, one of them told me what the young man was doing: "He's walking to success," the artist said.
The first time I stepped inside the doors at 1941 Dauphine St. was in 1993, when I went to meet Sister Bernadette McNamara, principal of Holy Redeemer. She knew that the elementary school she cherished would close soon, and she was near tears.
When I went back to visit her on the last day of school though, she was smiling. Her school was closing, she said, but it would reopen as Bishop Perry Middle School, and her fourth-grade boys would be the first fifth-graders there.
"We have a saying in Ireland that sometimes the Lord writes in crooked lines," she told me. "Sometimes, we don't understand what he's saying. We have to take it on faith, and wait."
This time around, the building has been reborn as a happy, welcoming place for neighbors in need, a place to help people "walk to success." And it was worth the wait.
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