Sr. Joannes Klas, seated in middle, is photographed at the end of June at St. Patrick Church in Hudson after one of her presentations about the parish where she lived for many years in Guatemala. St. Patrick’s has served as a sister parish to San Jose el Tesoro. (Submitted photo)
Jenny Snarski
Catholic Herald staff
As St. Patrick Catholic Church in Hudson celebrates 150 years of serving local spiritual needs, during the weekend of June 23-25 a special visitor highlighted ways the parish has served spiritual and physical needs of Guatemalans through a parish sisterhood with the community of San Jose el Tesoro in Yalpemech, Guatemala.
As Sr. Joannes Klas, affectionately known as Sister Jo, greeted listeners she noted that her own order, the Sisters of St. Francis – Milwaukee province, is celebrating their own sesquicentennial anniversary.
Raised in Fredonia, Sister Jo entered the community in 1952. Almost 20 years into her religious life, she was given permission to join a team of missionaries in Appalachia. From her first contact with the missionaries until she was able to move to Kentucky, the sister spent every vacation visiting the mission. She later spent three years supporting a coal miners’ strike and the workers’ families.
In 1981, Sister Jo felt called to Central America in a dream. When she contacted her superiors, she learned that bishops had recently requested sisters to serve refugees in Honduras and Mexico. After studying Spanish in Mexico, she travelled to the Mexico-Guatemala border. One of the sisters she met during her first trip to the country was kidnapped by a death squad in Honduras soon after.
In October 1982, alone and not knowing any of the other sisters in Honduras, she arrived and was taken to the “El Tesoro” refugee camp. With 30-40 people sharing one tent, she started out sleeping in a storage room. Sr. Jo was in the camp as an international observer and catechist to help prepare people for the sacraments.
In 1983, Caritas International asked for her help in starting a school in the camp. Since most of the refugees had never been to school, those with a third grade reading level were asked to teach first grade. Classes were held wherever they could find until classrooms were built with benches on dirt floors and plastic sheeting for walls. Pencils, paper and some books were provided for with funds from the U.N. Some of those original teachers now teach in the village school at San Jose el Tesoro.
One of the Guatemalan bishops had been working with the U.N. to find a site where families could be relocated with enough land so that each family could have 10 acres. In October 1990, a site was chosen near Yalpemech. A truck, loaded with boards from the school and church, was sent ahead to prepare temporary shelters. In February 1991, then 218 refugees were loaded into trucks and buses for a four-day trip to their new home. The second half of the people arrived in June to the village named after St. Joseph, honoring the March foundation of their new home, and including the name of the camp where they had been refugees.
From the beginning, education and health was the focus of Sr. Jo’s work. This was a challenge because the land given for the village had indigenous Mayan inhabitants. The community has learned to live as an amalgamation of mixed ethnicities and different languages.
Since this time, Sr. Jo has been joined by other sisters to help in her work. In 1997, she was able to address the United Nations in Switzerland after receiving an award for her work with the refugees, especially during the years before Guatemala’s civil war finally ended in 1996.
While Sr. Jo’s home parish in Fredonia provides funds to run a daycare center in the village, St. Patrick’s has provided funds, physical labor and medical expertise.
During her presentations, Sr. Jo expressed gratitude for the first solar telephones St. Patrick helped fund.
“Before, we had no means of communication,” she said. Moving several hundred people from a refugee camp in Honduras with no shelter and very little to eat, the two solar telephones were very helpful. Without electricity in the village, solar power was all they had.
Sr. Jo added, “If we were wage-earning people, we could’ve gotten a whole village with solar power, but at that point, we hardly had anything. Not even food for the table, much less a table to eat at.”
After driving a vehicle provided for the refugee camp by the United Nations, the Hudson Catholic community was able to provide a Toyota Land Cruiser for the village, 2.5 kilometers from the nearest road. “It was the only transportation in and out,” Sr. Jo said.
When electricity became a possibility, Sr. Jo negotiated to have a main line run to the village. From there, she organized villagers and volunteers to run power lines to each house.
Families received one outlet and two lightbulbs.
“That was a great improvement in the village,” she said. “Kids could study at night,” and some computers were able to be used. Some of the beginning computer classes were taught by visitors from St. Pat’s.
One year, a terrible hurricane tore the roof off the church and damaged the floor and walls. “People from this sister parish came down and helped us rebuild our church,” Sr. Jo recounted. “Now they’re building a bigger church.” Electricity is present and fans installed.
A community center has been built for town gatherings and there is a library book program for the school children. She clarified that many of these projects have benefitted the whole community, not just the Catholics.
She hopes that medical staff continues to visit San Jose el Tesoro. As most babies are born in the village, midwives have been trained. Health clinics are set up during every trip of St. Patrick volunteers that have greatly helped to improve villagers’ health.
Sr. Jo said they are still working on clean water as the village tank has a leak that needs work. “We have running water,” she teased, “if we run for it,” describing the women who collect water and bring it in jugs on their heads.
Many scholarships have been funded by St. Patrick parishioners – both fostering students and paying for teacher’s wages.
One of the most recent projects has been a collaboration to build stoves to improve health and cooking efficiency. With food cooked primarily on open fires, doctors had begun noticing lung damage from smoke inhalation. Seventy-five stoves have been installed, with families being asked to pay a small portion of the cost, with 25 more expected.
“I could go on and on and on,” Sr. Jo said. She added that Fr. John Gerritts’ numerous visits “did wonders” for the village. As one parish of 87 served by local priests, Mass is unable to be offered every Sunday. “That’s the way life is in the missions,” she said.
As Sr. Jo concluded, iterating her thanks for the parish’s time, talents and volunteerism, she assured that they are often remembered in prayer by the village.
Although she was reassigned to working with migrants in El Paso, Texas, Sr. Jo joked that she told her superiors she was only two years older than the pope, “and he’s got the whole world to think about.” She looks forward to joining one of the upcoming groups from Wisconsin to visit San Jose el Tesoro.
“You have been such a blessing,” she ended, “and the people of Guatemala remember you with open arms.”
