South Philadelphia Opens Homes, Hearts

by Tony West
This September, South Philadelphia will be greeting a throng of out-of-towners the likes of which they will never have seen before.
The draw is the Catholic World Meeting of Families, which is expected to bring up to 2 million visitors to metropolitan Philadelphia, which has a resident population of 6 million. Since there aren’t 2 million hotel rooms in the area, expect every guest room from Packer Avenue to South Street to be filled.

KARYSA Barlow stands before the bunk beds she is renting out during World Meeting of Families.

One South Philadelphia family that has signed up as a host is Dan & Karysa Barlow of Newbold, who have lived for two years in their classic two-story, three-bedroom rowhouse on a side street. They are looking forward to hosting a couple in their 50s from Argentina.
Hosts are allowed to set their own price for accommodations. “But we set the price pretty low,” said Karysa Barlow. “We were hoping to help people.”
Father Paul Kennedy, pastor of St. Katherine of Siena Church in Northeast Philadelphia, chairs the Housing Committee that is trying to find rooms for all these visitors. It is a complex process that keeps him busy seven days a week but, he said, “We have a great committee of people working on it.

Pope Francis’s party will be put up directly by the Archdiocese, Father Kennedy said. The bishops will all be staying at Center City Hotels.

Diocesan parishes have been asked to come up with accommodations for priests, Father Kennedy said. “So far, over 90 parishes have responded,” he noted. Four of them are in South Philadelphia, with two more hopefully to come in.

One of these parishes is St. Paul’s Church in Bella Vista. “We have an old rectory with lots of room,” explained its pastor Father John Large. “We have four rooms available and are planning to offer our guests breakfast as well.”

Religious brothers will be put up with local communities of brothers and sisters (“They’re coming in droves,” noted Father Kennedy) with sisters.

But the vast majority of attendees are lay people. All parishes have been asked to spread the word among their parishioners to make guest space available if possible.”

Father Joseph Kelley, pastor of St. Monica Church in Girard Estate, stated, “We have advertised the request in our church bulletin. But we don’t know how many have responded yet.”

This is because the appeal directs potential hoists to go to a central online hospitality service, Homestays.com, with which the WMF has a contract to handle the event.

The Barlows, who volunteered to share their home, are internationally minded. Karysa, who works at a child-welfare agency that serves South Philadelphia, has studied abroad in Chile, Nicaragua, Guatemala and Costa Rica and had warm experiences in Latin America. “It’ll be nice to return the favor,” she said with a smile. “It’s our way of demonstrating unity across diversity.”

Some Catholic institutions are planning to play a larger role in the WMF. St. Thomas Aquinas Church in Newbold defines its mission as serving the multicultural communities of South Philadelphia.

Large numbers of Vietnamese will be coming to the WMF, said St. Thomas’s pastor Msgr. Hugh Shields. Most of them will be staying in hotels in Center City or elsewhere. “But they have expressed an interest in holding intensive discussions on family values and their application to the church, in their own language. Our former convent, now the St. Thomas Center, is expected to host this programming for four evenings.” Msgr. Shields is preparing for at least 500 people to attend these sessions.

In addition, St. Thomas is putting up a few young Hispanics from Alabama so that they can benefit from the experience.

Many of Msgr. Shields’ parishioners are hosting lay visitors. “We also want our congregation to organize some multicultural meals so we can share the cultural richness of South Philadelphia,” he said.

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