Father Tom ventures to help where others no longer dare

The gangsters bow their heads in prayer, eyes shut. "Jingle Bells" sounds from a cellphone but goes unanswered. They shift positions and clasp hands - loose gold watches clinking, big gold chest medallions swaying, shiny leather shoes shuffling - and mumble "Amen."

Tom Hagan, a Catholic priest in a baseball cap, takes it in and grins. "God must be going: 'Whoa! Is that who I think it is down there sending up prayer?'" he jokes. One gang member, Moses, who understands English, laughs out loud. Then he puts on his dark sunglasses and scowls.

For most outsiders, Cité Soleil is a no man's land. Gang violence originating here is blamed for at least 800 dead in the capital of Port-au-Prince so far this year. United Nations forces seldom dare enter. They say the square-mile slum is a base for the kidnappings, rapes, arson, and extortions that are terrorizing the city in the lead-up to elections in November.

Most international aid organizations pulled out of Cité Soleil more than a year ago. "To go in there you basically need commando-style operations," says Damian Onses-Cardona, spokesman for the 8,000-strong UN peacekeeping force.

And then, there is "Father Tom," who visits what is arguably the poorest, most dangerous piece of property in the Western Hemisphere almost daily - with no armed escort. He's accompanied by his two right-hand men - Nelson Jin Liphete and Jonas Fleuriah - and his dog, Douglas.

The name of this slum, resting on Port-au-Prince's beachfront, ironically, means "City of the Sun." But it's a place where shacks are built on mounds of garbage, where entrepreneurs make patties out of mud - spiced with bouillon cubes - to sell as food, pigs slosh around in the sewage, and fires burn in abandoned concrete structures. Ten years ago, half a million people lived there. Today, no one knows. It's a place often described as having no roots, no tomorrow, and no hope.

Or, very little.

A Philadelphia native who spent seven years as Princeton University's chaplain, Father Tom started coming to Haiti in 1986 to do small projects with college students. A few years later, he started "Hands Together," a nonprofit Catholic development and relief organization (handstogether.org). He moved to Haiti in 1995. Today, working with a $500,000 per year budget in Cité Soleil, he operates a primary school with seven locations, which includes health clinics and feeding centers for students and the elderly.

"Father Tom gives us needed inspiration," says Sen. Mike DeWine (R) of Ohio, a fundraiser and stalwart of Hands Together. The organization has named its Cité Soleil schools in honor of DeWine's daughter, Becky, who died in a car crash.

Almost daily, Father Tom steers his battered Isuzu four-wheel drive truck past gang checkpoints to inspect the programs, encourage the teachers, scoop up half-naked children in the streets to tell them to go to classes - and meet with the gang leaders.

Soleil 17, Soleil 24, Boston, Belcourt. These are the names of some of the most notorious gangs in the slum. Once or twice a week their leaders, about two dozen men in their mid-20s, screech up in Jeeps - reggae tunes blaring, their security guys with machine guns in the back - to the gate of one of the Hands Together schools and politely greet Father Tom and his staff.

The gangsters then saunter through the school building, passing by crowded classrooms of children doing their ABCs. On the rooftop, overlooking the Caribbean on one side and a sea of squalid shacks on the other, they sit down on low school benches and turn their attention to the business of the day.

The priest hands out bottles of Coca Cola and Sprite - which they open up with their teeth. He feeds them rice and beans. And he updates them on Hands Together's planned activities - a new house-building initiative, an extra nurse for the clinic, a pilot literacy program to start - here and there, quietly, he throws in some sermonizing.

Page: 1 | 2