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Happening ... in the Local Church
From Noblesville to Appalachia
Couple's life-changing work 'a gift from God'
 Charlie
and Sue Schaffer, formerly of Noblesville and Our Lady of Grace Parish,
recently retired after 10 years as co-directors of the Auxier Center in
Auxier, Ky. (Photo provided) |
By Kevin Cullen
The
Catholic Moment
NOBLESVILLE — The mountains of eastern Kentucky are home to thousands of poor, uneducated people. Many live in rundown house trailers, and lack skills, jobs and hope.
In some hollows, living conditions are “as bad as Haiti,” says Charlie Schaffer, 67.
For 10 years, he and his wife, Sue, lived in Auxier, Ky., a town of 900 near the West Virginia line.
The Schaffers, formerly of Noblesville and Our Lady of Grace Church, recently retired as co-directors of the Auxier Center. There, they began educational programs and summer camps; organized thousands of volunteers who built and repaired hundreds of homes; gave away 6,000 home computers and distributed millions of dollars worth of free food, clothing, furniture and other necessities.
“We didn’t do it,” says Sue, 65. “God did.”
“We were called to this kind of work,” Charlie said. “Less than 1 percent of the people down there are Catholic. We were the only Catholics in Auxier. To have it take off the way it did was amazing. It is a faith thing.”
The home of Glenn and Melissa Horn was among those repaired through the Auxier Center. The couple has 10 children, seven still living at home. Volunteers enclosed a carport to create more space.
“They did so much for us. They’re just wonderful people. Charlie did everything he could to help us,” Melissa Horn said. “Our ceiling was falling into the kitchen, and the bathroom floor had big holes in it … They could take a hammer and just push it into the basement.”
Speaking of the Schaffers, Glenn Horn said, “I think they’re just the finest people that ever was. They were a gift from God, I believe. That is my feeling. We were sorry to see them leave. We bought them a chicken dinner the last day they were here.”
“People would leave changed by the people they served”
The Schaffers had been active in the Cursillo movement and the Christ Renews His Parish program as parishioners at Our Lady of Grace. Charlie was active in the Knights of Columbus and professional organizations.
Between them, the Schaffers made 11 missionary trips to Haiti. Sue is a registered nurse, a seamstress, and a former Girl Scout leader. Charlie, a retired podiatrist, has a strong background in business, marketing, administration and construction. Both have strong computer skills.
By 1998, their three children were grown, so the Schaffers retired, sold almost everything they owned, and decided to move to Haiti. That didn’t work out, so they sent an application to Father Ralph Beiting, a priest who has spent his life serving the poor of eastern Kentucky. He is the founder of the Christian Appalachian Project, and he established 10 Catholic churches that were the first in their counties.
First, Father Beiting asked them to run a 700-acre youth camp in southeastern Kentucky. “We had a trailer and we managed the place for a year,” Charlie said. “Sue was the camp nurse; I built roads.”
Then, from January to March 1999, they worked for the Haiti Health Foundation. Sue helped in a pharmacy and a dental clinic; Charlie established a treatment center for malnourished people and converted a chicken coop into an eye clinic.
Sue said they were convinced that God would send them where he wanted them to be, and that turned out to be Auxier, Ky. They arrived in October 1999, and opened the Auxier Lifetime Learning Center (the Auxier Center) in 2000.
“We didn’t know anything about the town,” Charlie said. “There we were, educated, Catholic flatlanders. We were given the school, and told to ‘get it running’ and support itself.”
Many of the local people didn’t like Catholics, but, Sue said, “they liked Father Beiting. We were OK because we were with him.”
The nine-classroom school, built in 1927, had closed in 1997. Father Beiting’s organization obtained it for use as a community center where people could socialize and take classes. It serves four Kentucky counties and parts of West Virginia.
Sue called a community meeting to learn what sorts of programs people wanted. That led to courses in home repair, computers, sewing and preparation for high-school equivalency tests. A food pantry was established.
In the rural county where Auxier is located, 38 percent of all residents over age 25 lack a high-school education. There are coal mines, but little commercial development because of the steep mountains. Poverty is everywhere.
Instead of offering free computer classes, Charlie charged $30 but promised a free computer as a reward for perfect attendance.
“When something is free, they don’t value it,” he said.
“In the first round of classes, we took 60 students and turned away 26,” he said. “There were no tests and I guaranteed them that they would learn how to run a computer.” He was the teacher.
He scrounged up donated computers to give away. A local man made the necessary repairs and updates. Later, computer repair classes were offered.
During the Schaffers’ tenure, the Auxier Center gave away 6,000 computers.
The center also became a hub for mission trips. Volunteers from churches and organizations all over the country paid to come and work on houses. They even bought the materials.
“Home repair was the biggest program we had,” Charlie said. “People would leave changed by the people they served.”
Charlie recalled two brothers, aged 78 and 82, who cooked on a wood-fired stove. They had no indoor plumbing, and their roof leaked so badly that they couldn’t go upstairs.
Five volunteer groups painted, added a metal roof and installed a shower on the back porch.
Then there was the woman who was raising seven grandchildren in a single-wide trailer. Her well was contaminated. Volunteers built a six-bedroom house and added a cistern to collect rainwater.
Mountain people, though poor, are proud, independent and fiercely protective. A house may be unsafe, but “this is the house they grew up in, and they want to die in it,” Sue said. “You have to work with them where they are.”
“You might suggest that they move to public housing, but they will say, ‘This is my house and I won’t move,’” Charlie said. “So we’d paint, add a deck, bring in water. We did more homes than probably anybody in eastern Kentucky; 60 homes in one four-month period.”
“God made things happen”
The center’s paid staff consisted only of the Schaffers, a secretary, and a man who ran the construction program. The Schaffers applied for grants and constantly solicited donations of money, materials and labor. They worked without pay for six years.
“God made things happen,” Sue said.
The food pantry served between 50 and 60 families per month, all from the Auxier area.
“It got to the point where I expected miracles,” Charlie said.
Gail Spradlin, the Auxier Center’s associate director, worked for the Schaffers for six years.
“They are wonderful,” she said. “They are giving and caring people.”
Without the Auxier Center, she said, many residents wouldn’t have computers, or safe homes. “I remember one lady we worked with the first year I was here. She lived with her mother in a mobile home, and you could see through the floor inside all the way to the ground,” she said. “They didn’t have any running water ...”
The same homeowner took classes at the Auxier Center and learned to read.
Spradlin credited the Schaffers for her own turnaround. Before being hired as a secretary, she barely supported herself and her son on the $6 an hour she earned working in a restaurant. She had divorced her abusive husband.
“I thought, ‘How will I manage?’” she said. “The Lord just worked it out. Charlie was willing to work with me, and let me (leave work to) pick up my son. Without them, I’d still be struggling. They were so good to me.”
Hand in Hand Ministries, of Louisville, Ky., had sent volunteers to the Auxier Center for several years. On Jan. 1, 2007, the Auxier Center was transferred to that organization to ensure that programs would continue.
In December 2009, the Schaffers retired and said goodbye to Auxier. A building at the center was named in their honor.
Now they live in a portable trailer. They plan to travel with it for two years
After that, who knows?
“God has worked through us,” Sue said. “It always works out that you have enough.”