BERLIN — “There’s always someone with a greater need.”
These were the words of guest speaker Jim Murray, former Philadelphia Eagles General Manager and founder of the first Ronald McDonald House in Philadelphia, at the fifth annual fundraising banquet for Good Counsel Homes-South Jersey, held here at Lucien’s Manor last Sunday evening.
A crowd of 300 attended the event for Good Counsel Homes-South Jersey, which since April 6 has operated a home in Riverside. It provides housing, food, clothing, educational opportunities, emotional support and guidance for homeless pregnant women.
Women like Mocha.
Last February, at the age of 20, she discovered she was pregnant. After refusing her family and friends’ wishes to abort her child, she was homeless until she found out about the April opening of the Good Counsel homes.
“All glory and honor to God,” she said, adding “I believed God would bring me through this difficult and trying time.”
“Good Counsel Homes accepted me for who I was, even if my family didn’t,” she said.
Today, Mocha is living with her new son, Carter Emmanuel Lee, at her “home away from home.”
Started in 1985 by Father Benedict Groeschel, a Franciscan Friar of the Renewal, and Christopher Bell, Good Counsel Homes has five homes in New York.
Opening the evening, Brenda Quinn, a member of the South Jersey Executive Committee, thanked the supporters for their help in the opening of the Riverside home, which is now filled to capacity, with six babies born since the home’s first day.
All the mothers in the home, she said, who decided to give birth to their children, “are the true pro-life heroes,” she said.
Jim Murray, the guest speaker, spent more than 14 years in the Philadelphia Eagles’ organization, with almost 10 of them as general manager, from 1974-1983. While with the team, he started the successful Eagles Fly for Leukemia campaign, and was a founder of the first Ronald McDonald House in Philadelphia, and is currently a board member.
With homes around the nation, the Ronald McDonald Houses provide temporary homes, at little or no cost, to families of children who are receiving treatment at nearby hospitals.
Without organizations like Good Counsel, he said, newborn babies “wouldn’t get a chance” at life.
Murray read a letter he received from a 15-year-old boy with cancer. The boy mentioned that “I can still live life to the fullest,” and he has developed “a stronger appreciation for friends and family…I can adapt, appreciate and love on a whole different level.”
At the closing of his talk, Murray led the crowd in a rendition of “Silent Night,” a song serving as a reminder that “everytime someone is born, its Christ Incarnate,” said Christopher Bell, who also spoke at the event.
at the bottom and then tap “Add to Home Screen”