The Catholic Church’s Best Kept Secret

An unseasonably cold and steady June downpour meant nearly every guest at the Mustard Seed kitchen and food pantry ate their dinner of hot dogs, macaroni and fruit in some degree of discomfort. 

Though the start of summer was less than a week away, diners — called guests at the Worcester nonprofit — were bundled in wet jackets and hats or sodden hoodies. Between serving meals, volunteer Paula Bushey fielded requests for blankets, backpacks, clothes, sneakers and sleeping bags from people preparing for another night outdoors. 

For some, the street feels safer than the shelter, Bushey explained, as she handed Felicia (last name withheld) a pair of size 8 sneakers. Felicia nodded. But a night out in the rain means every item she is carrying will end up soaked, and she has no way of drying anything. Felicia confided that she’d been hospitalized 15 times for exposure-related pneumonia since becoming homeless last year. 

Next, two elementary school-aged boys asked for socks. They are Afghan refugees and brothers who arrived with their parents and nine siblings in Worcester after the United States military’s withdrawal from Afghanistan. Bushey gave each boy two pairs from an armoire, which also contained single-use bottles of shampoo, cakes of soap, underwear and other necessities. More guests gathered. Are there backpacks, blankets, coats, socks, and T-shirts? they asked. 

All the while, meals were served, takeout bags prepared, and water and coffee distributed. What was clear on this stormy night: There is chronic need in the city, New England’s second-largest. 

Amid all the activity, Mustard Seed co-founder Frank Kartheiser ’72, Hon. ’19 was in constant movement, preparing meals, serving guests and busing tables as he has done for more than 50 years. Now 75, he founded the organization in 1972 with his wife, the late Mary Brenda Norton Kartheiser, scholar-activist Michael Boover and the late Shawn Donovan ’70. Kartheiser is quiet, discreet and solicitous in the way a maître d’ at a five-star restaurant would be. 

“He lives the Gospels; he lives Jesus’ message,” Bushey notes. “Sometimes we have guests that cause problems, and sometimes we want to ban people because of the way they behave — and we do. But Frank's message is, ‘The only thing I know that works is love.’” 

Kartheiser makes you want to be a better person, Bushey says, calling him the very model of Catholic Social Teaching (CST). The inclination is to agree vigorously, but to what, exactly?

“CATHOLIC SOCIAL TEACHING IS AN ORIENTATION” 

Rooted in the ministry of Jesus Christ, the foundation of CST was laid in 1891, when Pope Leo XIII published an encyclical (a papal teaching document) titled “Rerum Novarum” (“Of New Things”). The letter was a response to the particular historical moment — the advent of the Industrial Revolution — and addressed workers’ rights, economic inequality and collective responsibility, among other labor-related topics.

Image

Pope Leo XIII (right) published "Rerum Novarum" in 1891 in response to the Industrial Revolution, addressing workers' rights, economic inequality and collective responsibility.

Justin Poché is an associate professor in the College’s history department. In teaching CST, Poché begins with an examination of the pressures placed upon society by three events that made the 19th-century American Catholic Church a church of the working class and the poor: the unregulated rise of industrial capitalism, the rise of socialism in Europe and the mass migration of various European ethnic groups to the United States. Before “Rerum Novarum,” the Church had not taken a definitive stance on labor relations and the rights of workers, Poché says. 

“But the Church saw an urgent need to position itself on the side of the laboring classes and the poor. ‘Rerum Novarum’ was quite a paradigm shift in terms of the Church’s position, but it’s rooted in the realities facing most of its members,” Poché says. “Catholic Social Teaching is defensive in response to the rise of socialism, but it also condemns the abuses of capitalism and the exploitation of workers. 

“It carves a middle path that both protects the right to private property, while also calling for interventions to both address the miserable conditions in which the majority of workers lived and promote the common good of all people,” he continues. “I think that’s why the modern pope chose the name he did, because he’s seeing how, once again, technology might undermine the rights of laborers and worsen the material inequalities that threaten human dignity and solidarity.”

At its core, CST operates from an absolute: Human life is sacred and dignity is inherent. A fundamental approach to one’s faith, CST is the Church’s social vision and addresses a range of social issues, ancient and current.

According to the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, CST coalesces around seven key themes:

1. 1. Life and Dignity of the Human Person.
2. The Call to Family, Community and Participation.
3. Rights and Responsibilities.
4. The Option for the Poor and Vulnerable.
5. The Dignity of Work and the Rights of Workers.
6. Solidarity.
7. Care for God’s Creation. 

“Catholic Social Teaching is an orientation,” says the Rev. Keith Maczkiewicz, S.J., associate vice president for mission and ministry at Holy Cross. “It’s not about deploying the principles, per se; it’s about inhabiting the principles so that a person’s life is oriented that way.” 

Life and Dignity of the Human Person condemns abortion, euthanasia, cloning, embryonic stem cell research and the death penalty. It counsels people to work to avoid war. If this first theme is a call, the remaining six are a response, guiding people as to their responsibilities to other human beings and the planet in a shared mission: to follow Jesus’ example and work together for the common good. 

“At the end of the day,” Fr. Maczkiewicz notes, “the Gospels are meant to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable.” 

Holy Cross President Vincent D. Rougeau is a CST scholar and author of the 2008 book, “Christians in the American Empire: Faith and Citizenship in the New World Order,” which examines America’s politics and legal system through a CST lens.

“The common good comes out of a recognition that when we act together with interest in the good of others, something new emerges,” Rougeau says. “Something that really binds and creates a meaningful understanding of community.”

Image

Clockwise from left: Pope Leo XIV; Rev. Keith Maczkiewicz, S.J.; history professor Justin Poché; cover of Holy Cross President Vincent D. Rougeau's book, "Christians in the American Empire: Faith and Citizenship in the New World Order"; President Rougeau.

Arguably, one recent example of common good was the October 2024 announcement that Holy Cross would offer full tuition grants to students whose families’ total annual household income amounts to less than $100,000. Over the 2023-2024 academic year, the College provided $76.5 million in financial aid, with 65% of Holy Cross students receiving need-based grants. 

“I think making sure that we are bringing students to the College who might not otherwise have an opportunity to be here is critical,” Rougeau says. “It’s part of the work, part of the ministry. This can’t just be a place for people of means. And as we bring people into our community who are coming from perspectives that we don’t necessarily share, we must be open to making changes so that they feel they are fully members, fully participants.” 

And that’s where solidarity enters: CST reminds people that the commandment to love thy neighbor carries no caveats. 

“You can open your doors to people of various backgrounds, people of lower income, but if you’re saying, ‘Hey, join us; become like us, but there’s nothing that you’re bringing to us that we need,’ well, that’s demeaning and demoralizing. So we need to be open to learning from them as well,” he notes. 

The idea of a common good also underpins the College’s view of its relationship with its home of 182 years, Worcester. “Our role in the community isn’t just about what we could do for the community or what we do for the city, but what this city gives us in terms of opportunities provided to our students,” Rougeau says. “So, we’re using that model to enrich and reframe what a college or university does as a part of the fabric of an urban space.”

WORKING WITH AND LEARNING FROM 

Michelle Sterk Barrett is director of the College’s J.D. Power Center for Liberal Arts in the World. She first encountered CST during her postgraduate year of service at the Office of Urban Affairs of the Archdiocese of Hartford, Connecticut. The office, whose work addressed affordable housing, urban education, food insecurity and community organizing and advocacy, put Catholic Social Teaching into action, Sterk Barrett says. 

“I realized then what the Gospel message meant in terms of being in solidarity with people who are suffering,” Sterk Barrett says. 

Sterk Barrett realized she wanted to devote her professional life to recreating that transformative experience for other young adults, a calling that led her to community-based learning at Holy Cross. 

The J.D. Power Center oversees the College’s Community-Based Learning (CBL) courses, which complement students’ classroom learning with service and research projects in Worcester. More than 1,000 Holy Cross students take a CBL course annually; participants report overwhelmingly (91% in 2023-2024 surveys) that their CBL courses spurred both intellectual and personal growth, Sterk Barrett notes.

Image

“I hope our students grow into being engaged members of their communities with a sense of responsibility and intentionality about the choices they make throughout their lives,” Michelle Sterk Barrett says.

CST delineates service-based learning from one-time, one-directional charitable work. This is not the rich helping the poor. Community-based learning underscores the concept of human dignity by emphasizing that Holy Cross students are working with and learning from the broader Worcester community, as opposed to participating in a kind of top-down charity, Sterk Barrett and other College educators say. To live the principles of CST, in this instance, is to work toward a lasting common good, as opposed to performing a one-time, limited intervention. 

“I hope our students grow into being engaged members of their communities with a sense of responsibility and intentionality about the choices they make throughout their lives,” Sterk Barrett says. “Ideally, they will consider the needs of those who are vulnerable and approach their engagement with a sense of humility, recognizing they don’t have all the answers.”

TO BE IN RIGHT RELATIONSHIP IS HARD WORK 

CST is democratic with one explicit exception: It teaches that seeking a common good requires people to put the needs of the poor and vulnerable first. This can be difficult, even for those who’ve dedicated their lives to serving others. Modernity makes it hard to work for societal change entirely independent of power structures. Even for clergy. 

There is tension in servant leadership, Fr. Maczkiewicz says. “Are we supposed to be living on the streets among our brothers and sisters, so we have credibility, or are we supposed to be at the center of where power, where decisions, are being made?” he asks. “We’re actually supposed to be in both of those places, which is where discernment comes in,” he continues. “You’ve heard the phrase ‘contemplatives in action.’ That’s the umbrella phrase that comes of considering how you can be a contemplative and be in action. You can’t. You’re going to have to live in this tension all the time.”

In November 1990, the United States Catholic Conference issued “A Century of Social Teaching: A Common Heritage, A Continuing Challenge,” whose very title underscores the difficulty inherent in following the doctrine. The document is plainspoken: 

“Catholics have been challenged to understand more clearly and act more concretely on the social demands of the Gospel. This tradition calls all members of the Church, rich and poor alike, to work to eliminate the occurrence and effects of poverty, to speak out against injustice, and to shape a more caring society and a more peaceful world.” 

Professor Mary Roche ’90, a Catholic ethicist in the religious studies department at Holy Cross, was first introduced to CST as an undergraduate studying Latin American liberation theology. Asked why Catholic Social Teaching seems to be unfamiliar to so many — “A Century of Social Teaching” characterizes it as an “unknown resource” — Roche also cites the discomfort it causes, especially in relation to free-market capitalism and accumulation of wealth. CST demands more than philanthropy, tithing or a “duty to charity,” Roche explains: 

“It’s very hard to give from your need or ’til it really hurts. It’s also really hard to fight to change a system that benefits you in some way and leaves other people perpetually insecure.” 

Image

“Catholic Social Teaching wants us to address the root causes [of social issues], not merely to continue to treat the symptoms,” says Professor Mary Roche ’90.

Catholic Social Teaching calls people to act in solidarity, as one human family, pursuing social justice. Put another way: to love thy neighbor. If a government or an economy serves only some of its members, CST calls upon people to work for more just systems through advocacy and policy change. 

“Catholic Social Teaching wants us to address the root causes [of social issues], not merely to continue to treat the symptoms,” Roche says.

Michele C. Murray, senior vice president for student development and mission at Holy Cross, has written extensively on Ignatian spirituality and students’ intellectual, spiritual and emotional development. She co-authored the 2010 book, “Helping College Students Find Purpose: The Campus Guide to Meaning-Making.” Murray, too, recognizes the tensions CST brings to the fore. 

“Our faith isn’t just about acts of piety or participation in the sacraments,” she says. “It’s also about caring deeply for one another and following the two great commandments: Love God with your whole heart, mind and soul, and love your neighbor as yourself. That’s what Catholic Social Teaching is all about. 

“At the end of the day, it’s about being in right relationship with God and with each other, right relationship with the natural world,” she continues. “And what does it mean to be in right relationship? It’s a big question that we endeavor to answer here at Holy Cross and throughout our lives.”

Image

Michele C. Murray, senior vice president for student development and mission at Holy Cross, has written extensively on Ignatian spirituality and students’ intellectual, spiritual and emotional development. To the right is the 2010 book she co-authored.

A HEART BROKEN OPEN 

The lessons of CST can be the difference between being heartbroken and having a heart broken open when witnessing suffering in the world. And people don’t have to go far to feel the effect. Ines de la Fuente ’25 is as proud as any biological big sister can be when asked about Camilla, the sixth grader she mentored for three years through the College’s 50-plus-year-old Student Programs for Urban Development (SPUD).

“She’s hoping to be a WNBA player; that’s her dream and she is really good,” de la Fuente says. “She’s a good leader among her peers and not afraid to raise her opinions.” 

Her experience in SPUD reinforces what de la Fuente learned in the classroom; in effect, the theoretical becomes a felt experience. “I took a class through the religious studies department called The Challenge of Happiness, and the theme was that happiness needs to be rooted in a commitment to the good of the other, not in pursuit of your own fleeting moments of joy,” de la Fuente explains.

Her observations are a familiar refrain for Salena Ibrahim, an assistant chaplain in the Office of the College Chaplains, who runs the Arrupe Immersion Program, more commonly known as the Spring Break Immersion Program. Among Ibrahim’s duties is supervising students who lead immersion trips. Many return fundamentally changed, she says. 

“They don't know exactly what happened, but something has happened, and it's changed the way that they view the world around them,” Ibrahim says. “There's this stirring and this desire to do something about the injustices that they’ve seen.”

“NOT A SINGLE EYE WAS DRY” 

As a first-year student, Julia Clarke ’25 traveled to the former mining town of Ivanhoe, Virginia, on an immersion trip. The town left a vivid impression. 

“We’d drive past houses that had fallen into disrepair or been abandoned. One thing very noticeable was the lack of children,” Clarke says. “The lack of young people gave the town more the feeling of a dying place than a thriving space.” 

She wells up talking about Ivanhoe, but the emotion behind her tears is complicated. While there, Clarke and her fellow students encountered an Ivanhoe-born-and-bred social worker, Beth, who shared her experience growing up there. The town has no business district, no industry at all except for the post office, fire station and a Dollar General. The nearest place to get fresh produce is 20 minutes away, and Walmart, 30 minutes away, is the closest steady employer.

“Beth described what it meant to come of age in a place like Ivanhoe after the mines closed. She said that seeing educationseeking young adults like us showed her, at a pivotal moment of her life, that she could also have that kind of a future,” Clarke says. “Not a single eye was dry after she finished her speech.” 

Clarke made three more immersion trips in her years at Holy Cross and also volunteered with SPUD.

“These experiences, and especially Beth’s story, have taught me that my life should be committed to the well-being of others and to improve society by striving to be a person for and with others,” Clarke continues. “I look back now with so much gratefulness and joy that I could have such a transformative experience.”

Image

Salena Ibrahim (left), an assistant chaplain in the Office of the College Chaplains, and Frank Kartheiser ’72, Hon. ’19, co-founder of Mustard Seed.

“WE’RE ALL IN THIS TOGETHER” 

Many more transformative experiences will be necessary to power the Mustard Seed through its next 50 years. Most of its volunteers are older people, and the ripple effect of parish churches closing means there are fewer organizations providing meals nowadays. Fifty-three years into the lived experience of Catholic Social Teaching, Kartheiser will tell you his goal is to see the organization he founded go out of business, but not for lack of support. Kartheiser wants policy enacted that ensures the hungry are fed and the poor clothed, for more than one evening at a time.

He could be bitter, but that would be a turning inward, a surrender of sorts. Yet Kartheiser’s focus is outward: 

“We have this great body of wisdom around this social effort of charity and justice, and at the soup kitchen, people are guests, because we're all in this together. The Mustard Seed is open to everyone and everybody eats. That's the Mustard Seed slogan. Everybody eats, right? 

“And there's no question about that.”