Women’s council seeks higher profileThe National Council of Catholic Women open their national convention in Jacksonville with a call to become better known in the Church and community. 
DENISE O’TOOLE KELLY | FC Posted: 09.25.09 | Updated: 10.01.09 JACKSONVILLE | It’s time to blow the lid off one the U.S. Catholic Church’s best–kept secrets, in the opinion of Judy Powers of St. Juliana Parish in West Palm Beach. Powers, outgoing Florida province leader for the National Council of Catholic Women, said she’s tired of being part of a “secret society” and wants to make the good works of the women’s organization as well–known as those of “that other organization with the funny hats.” Her reference to the Knights of Columbus drew a laugh from her audience of more than 900 at the opening session of the women’s group’s national convention Sept. 24 in Jacksonville. “If more women knew what we did, they’d want to be part of it,” Powers said during her campaign speech for the next office she was seeking in the organization, regional vice president. She was elected to the post Sept. 25. What the National Council of Catholic Women does — according to interviews with some of the hundreds of Florida members at this year’s convention as well as the organization’s bylaws — is unite individual Catholic women to allow them to grow spiritually and make a difference from the parish level on up to the international stage. “We are a very powerful voice for women not only in the U.S., but all over the world,” said Wendy Dawson, a parishioner of St. Frances Xavier Cabrini Parish in Parrish. Dawson explained that the national organization lobbies for the common good on issues being considered in Washington, D.C.; has a representative to the United Nations and the Vatican’s Pontifical Council for Peace and Justice; and belongs to the World Union of Catholic Women’s Organizations. The National Council of Catholic Women will turn 90 and the world organization will turn 100 next year, she said. “Here we are, a long–lived organization that has been speaking for women for many generations, and that’s very powerful.” FLORIDA INVOLVEMENT STRONGThe national organization faces sharply declining membership and related financial woes — challenges that delegates confronted during much of the convention schedule, which ran through Sept. 27. But the membership is still a sizeable force, with all women who belong to 4,000 parish– and diocese–level affiliates, plus 4,000 individuals who have joined on their own, counted among the national membership, according to spokeswoman Andrea Schellman. (Under a bylaws change approved Sept. 25 at the convention, the membership from now on will be counted differently, Schellman said, with all members of affiliate groups being asked to join the national organization individually.) Schellman said it’s encouraging that in Florida, which has 212 parish affiliate groups, all six dioceses and one archdiocese are associated with the National Council of Catholic Women. Enthusiasm for the national group in the Diocese of Venice was apparent in the size of the contingent attending the national convention. According to Barbara Chamberlain of Sacred Heart Parish in Punta Gorda, the diocese’s delegation of 50 woman was second only to that of the hosting Diocese of St. Augustine. “In general, the National Council (of Catholic Women) gives us the opportunity to become closer and closer to God,” said Catherine McGourtny of St. Peter the Apostle Parish in Naples. Dorothy Bragg of Our Lady of Lourdes Parish in Venice noted that for each biennial convention, the national council selects a local charity in the host city to support. This year, the women provided toiletries to the largest homeless shelter in Jacksonville, she said. PRAYER, FELLOWSHIPAlong with social action and works of charity, prayer is a big part of the National Council of Catholic Women’s role in the Church, Florida women said. Nancy Nesselt of St. Bernadette Parish in Hollywood is active at the national level with the Church Commission of the organization, which was renamed the Spirituality Commission Sept. 25. “I look for things for me to bring back to spread the word on the archdiocese level,” Nesselt said. She said prayer for the Church, its clergy and the faithful are even more important in these economic times. “People lose faith and they shouldn’t,” she said. “I just feel there are a lot of people who are floundering. They don’t know what’s going to happen and they just have to keep the faith.” And then there’s the sisterhood. “The friendships are probably the biggest thing that I get from working on different projects with these ladies,” said Marty Duesel of Blessed Trinity Parish in Ocala, noting that those projects range from working in the parish gift shop to raising awareness about human trafficking. “I think the great part is that it informs the women of things that are happening that we don’t have exposure to in everyday life.” Barbara Asfendis of St. Bernadette Parish in Hollywood called the range of work done by women’s council members “amazing.” “One of the primary benefits is the sisters I’ve inherited,” Asfendis said, noting that she was an only child. “I don’t think that I would have made friends with all these ladies if I wasn’t in council.” LIFTING UP WOMENAsfendis said working on the archdiocesan council’s scholarship program has been among her most satisfying work. “We give it to eighth–grade girls in a Catholic school who want to continue to a Catholic high school,” she said. The targeting of the scholarship program at girls — like the council’s national–level attention to the problem of human trafficking, which disproportionately has female victims — demonstrates members’ will to empower women. As Mary Cook and Peg Middleton of Sts. Peter and Paul Parish in Winter Park sat waiting for the afternoon session of the convention to begin Sept. 24, Cook reached for the words to describe her passion in the context of the women’s council. “The thing that is near and dear to me is helping women who are, I don’t want to say disadvantaged; … women and children who have nobody and they look for people who can help,” Cook said. At that moment, Middleton’s attention was grabbed by a slide shown on the auditorium screen. “It was just up there: helping people who can’t help themselves,” she said. Middleton, who identified human trafficking as her big issue, said of her involvement in the National Council of Catholic Women: “I feel it makes a difference. I feel that we have been for the past almost 90 years a voice for the Catholic women in the United States, and the only way that some will be heard.”
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