What's Happening

May 21, 2025, Detroit – The site where children once attended St. Matthew School in Detroit will now be home to another group of children and their families. 

Representatives of the City of Detroit, the Archdiocese of Detroit, Catholic Charities leaders, and civic leaders attended the ribbon-cutting ceremony at the Residences at St. Matthew in early May. 

“It was a great gathering, manifesting the importance of people and organizations working together,” said Sister Nancyann Turner, OP. She ministered for more than 20 years at the Rosa Parks Children’s and Youth Program at the Capuchin Soup Kitchen in Detroit.

“I was able to watch this project, along with projects in [four other cities] develop from ground-breaking to opening and move-in,” said Sister Donna Markham, OP, former President and CEO of Catholic Charities USA (CCUSA). “It was a thrilling experience to see moms and children literally moving from the streets, or from living in their cars, into beautiful, fully-equipped, safe apartments. It was a great day in Detroit!”

Construction began in November 2023 for the apartment complex, slated to include at least 46 apartments, including 36 one-bedroom apartments, four two-bedroom apartments, and six studio units. Healthcare and other services will be provided to the residents through Catholic Charities of Southeastern Michigan, Henry Ford St. John Hospital, and other partners.

To qualify, households had to earn no more than 30 percent, 50 percent, or 60 percent of the median income for the Detroit area. 

Sister Donna noted that the project took shape with the assistance of Archbishop Allen Vigneron and his team, Catholic Charities USA, Catholic Charities of Southeast Michigan, and Ascension Health. “St. Matthew’s parishioners and the pastor, Rev. Duane Novelly, were key to the success of the project,” she said. “Generously, the Capuchin Friars fully furnished and equipped over 20 apartments, down to the fully stocked kitchens and bedding.”

Seven years ago, CCUSA began the pilot of the Healthy Housing Initiative with five dioceses across the country. Detroit was one of the cities that Sister Donna and her team chose, along with Las Vegas; Portland, Oregon; St. Louis; and Spokane.

“Many groups and individuals worked together to make this happen,” Sister Nancyann said. “It took tremendous work and cooperation among the many participants in this endeavor – including national and local Catholic Charities agencies, Mayor Michael Duggan and his many Detroit offices of housing, Henry Ford Medical Services, the Archdiocese of Detroit, construction companies, finance companies, and of course the people and pastor of St. Matthew’s Parish.”

Sister Donna noted that three requirements for participation in the CCUSA pilot program were “a bishop who was willing to make available underutilized church property, a Catholic Charities agency with a director who could lead housing development, and a Catholic health system that would assist with medical support services.”

The Healthy Housing Initiative “was one of the many beautiful things I was involved in during my nine-year tenure as president of CCUSA,” Sister Donna said. She encouraged anybody who has the opportunity to stop by and see Residences at St. Matthew. “It is well worth witnessing this little miracle in Detroit,” she said.

Read more about Residences at St. Matthew in this Detroit Catholic article by Daniel Meloy.
 

Caption for above feature photo: Sister Donna Markham, OP, back left, watches as, from left, Paul Propson, CEO of Catholic Charities of Southeast Michigan; Detroit Auxiliary Bishop Arturo Cepeda; and Msgr. Charles Kosanke, Chairman of the Board of Catholic Charities of Southeast Michigan cut the ribbon for the new Residences at St. Matthew. 
Photo by Valaurian Waller, Courtesy of The Detroit Catholic

May 9, 2025, Adrian, Michigan – “Oh, Sister, I’m not hungry for food. I’m hungry for talk. I’m hungry for somebody to listen to me. I’m hungry for somebody not to judge me.”

Those were the words of Dawn, a transgender woman who, in 1999, spoke to Sister Luisa DeRouen, OP, a Dominican Sister of Peace, asking for understanding and spiritual accompaniment. This conversation propelled Sister Luisa to move from her ministry with gay and lesbian people to ministry with the transgender population.

Sister Luisa spoke of this experience and what she has learned about transgenderism in her presentation, Ministering with the Transgender Population. Her April 30, 2025, talk – transmitted via Zoom to Weber Center on the Adrian Dominican Sisters Motherhouse Campus and via livestream – was one of a series of presentations offered by the Congregation’s Office of Racial Equity and Cultural Inclusion. 

Speaking to an audience that included Adrian Dominican Sisters, Sister Luisa began with her hope: “I hope I can give you language today so you can speak up for [people in the transgender population] with more suitable language. You may have transgender and nonbinary people in your families.”

Sister Luisa explained a new understanding of sexuality. “Being transgender is a neuro-biological issue,” she said. “It is a biological issue, not a moral or psychological issue.” She said five criteria determine a person’s sex: genitalia, chromosomes, hormones, internal genitals, and the brain. “For most of us, they all line up, but for transgender people, that is not the case,” she said. “Being transgender is for real. It’s a real condition, and transgender people need appropriate, professional medical care.”

Sister Luisa asked Catholic Sisters to be a helpful resource for the spiritual dimension of the lives of transgender individuals. 

“For trans people, the primary process is transitioning,” Sister Luisa said. “I walked with them through the transition, and who they are on the other side of the transition. There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that it’s a spiritual transition,” though one that’s experienced differently, and that entails different components for each person.

Sister Luisa spoke of the grace that’s available to transgender individuals when they go through transition – whether socially with a change in clothes or hairstyle or medically with hormones or surgery. Once they transition, she said, they often need to renegotiate every aspect of their lives, from relationships with family and friends to their jobs. 

“They’re in a liminal, unknown place – and that is the most profound place where we find God,” Sister Luisa said. “They experience the grace of God’s spirit – self-hatred turns to self-love …. They still have problems like we do, but they can deal with life’s challenges from a place of integrity and honesty and much deeper self-knowledge, knowing how precious they are to God.”

She addressed the issue of the use of hormone therapy for children, with many arguing that children don’t know who they are and that hormone therapy would not be right for them. Until last year, she said, children who believed they were transgender had to have parental consent up to the age of 18 for hormone treatment or surgery. That age has been changed to 16, she said.

Some arguments claim that “any kid can walk up and say they’re transgender,” Sister Luisa noted. “But the norm is to go slowly and very carefully” before prescribing hormone therapy or surgery. “If the child is persistent, consistent, and insistent for [only] six months, it doesn’t make the criteria” for transgenderism. “It’s judged case by case.” Some children might have been misdiagnosed. “There are not enough doctors trained well enough. But for the most part, transgender children are getting the appropriate care.”