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CSS recognizes Christian Service awardees

By RAFE MIDDEKE
Messenger staff

There were tears, laughter, song, praise — and much thanks from awardees and toasters — at the April 30 annual Catholic Social Services’ (Metro-East Region) 20th Annual Christian Service Awards and Benefit Dinner. But all the words broadcast a single message: Recipients of the award are inspirational symbols of Jesus’ message of love of God and neighbor.

Awardees were:
Helen Fiedler, member of St. Teresa Parish, Belleville;
Pastor Kendall Granger, pastor at New Life Community Church in East
St. Louis; Father Osang Idagbo CM, administrator at SS. Peter and
Paul Parish in Waterloo; and Pastor Camilla Weatherall, pastor at Deliverance Mission Church in Belleville.

Bob Kenney, toaster for Helen Fiedler, called her a “beatitude” woman. “The beatitudes are all about humility, mercy, peace-making. She lives them,” he said. Looking for a comparison he recalled his student days at Notre Dame University and the inspiration of the young university president, the renowned Father Theodore Hesburgh, CSC — a man who preached and lived the beatitudes. “Helen,” Kenney said, “is like Father Hesburgh.”

Fiedler has served on “every parish committee at St. Teresa’s,” he said. She and her husband, Paul, were involved in Althoff Catholic High School’s activities, which their seven children attended. She has been a hospital and nursing home lay minister, and a volunteer in many interdenominational and civic organizations.

As a long-time blood and platelet donor and organizer and donor, she received a plaque from Barnes Hospital for 100 donations.

Pastor Kendall Granger’s New Life Community Church, founded in 2000, started small, with 12 members. Today the church has a faithful following of over 1,000 members, with a philosophy of “inclusion and practicality.” He considers his most important ministry a Men’s Mentoring program, with the goal of repairing his community by rebuilding families. “That’s what it’s going to take to get East St. Louis back,” he said, “not stimulus, not gambling boats, not just jobs, but men and families coming together to guide that next generation.”

The New Life Community Church was featured in the documentary, “American Character Along Highway 50,” narrated by Tom Brokaw.

Toaster Cindy Lyles used an alphabet, A to Z listing to describe Pastor Granger’s character and ministry. Examples included: “awesome,” “entrepreneur,” “jack of all trades,” “leader,” “passionate,” “trailblazer,” “witness for Christ.”
Pastor Granger and his wife of 17 years, Wyvetta, have two children, Lynneshea and Kendall Jr.

Vincentian Father Osang Idagbo was ordained to the priesthood in 2005 in Nigeria. Before coming to the Diocese of Belleville in 2008, Father Idagbo served as a secretary and treasurer in his Vincentian community, as a school chaplain and associate pastor.

Father Idagbo is described as an active and energetic participant in SS. Peter and Paul’s organizations and activities, interacting with the parish elementary school’s and PSR students.

Toaster Father Urban Osuji, CM said Father Idagbo is a “man of prayer and deep faith,” and said “he has a good sense of humor and can act different voices.”

As a school chaplain in Nigeria, he “was a friend of the young people who confided in him.” Father Osuji made special mention of his ability to know the names not only of adults but of the children “who flock around him all the time.”
In an appreciative gesture, and a surprise presence at the award ceremony, were members of St. Peter and Paul’s junior high chorus. Their performance and presence expressed their appreciation of Father Idagbo’s ministry.

When toaster Freda Blanchard reflected on how to share Pastor Camilla Weatherall’s “multi-faceted characteristics of this powerful woman of God, I thought of four words to describe my pastor: a woman of integrity, peace, holiness and strength. Whatever God gives to her she gives freely to others.”

Pastor Weatherall is described in multi-vocational terms as a pastor/educator/mentor/counselor. She has mentored adults and taught children for the past 19 years. Because of her passion for education she plans to found and oversee a Christian school in the near future. She has served in many social and charitable programs in the Belleville community, and has a weekly television broadcast.

Described as a “trendsetter and visionary,” her current true passion is the founding of her Trinity Home Project, “a women’s/children’s safe home, with a substance abuse deliverance program and work-study program designed for women who want to find God.” Pastor Weatherall is the devoted mother of Morgan Chinara.

Presenting the Christian Service Awards were Brad Beck, director of CSS’s Metro-East Region, and Roberta Meehan, director of the Belleville Regional Advisory Board.