Glenmary Home Missioners - Serving Rural America Since 1939

Brother Joe Steen, along with volunteers, works on a Habitat home in Pontotoc, Mississippi.

It's a hot August Saturday in Pontotoc, a small town in northeast Mississippi. The modest rectangular three-bedroom house sits on a side road surrounded mostly by vacant lots and woods. On the walk in front there are bicycles, a lawn mower, a water bowl, and a sleeping dog. Two of Wanda Vaughn's sons come to the door first. They introduce me to Raven, the dog. Ms. Vaughn follows shortly. She's a pale, red-haired woman in her mid-30s. She speaks softly because two younger children are still asleep.

"A year ago," she says, "we were all stacked up in a tiny apartment paying $425 a month in rent-way more than a third of my paycheck. We could never get ahead enough to even think about buying a place."

"This house is a dream come true. We moved in last New Year's Day. It was our Christmas present."

Wanda Vaughn's Christmas present came from the volunteers of Pontotoc County's Habitat for Humanity, a program which builds low-cost housing and helps low-income families become homeowners. But the house wasn't just a gift. She and her children worked for it. Every Habitat homeowner family is required to put in 500 hours of labor, or "sweat equity" in lieu of a cash down payment. The rest of the labor is donated, as are many of the materials and, in this case, the land.

Next door to Wanda Vaughn's house another dream is coming true. There, behind two giant mounds of hill country red dirt, sits the shell of an old wood frame country house. Men on ladders are hammering sheets of vinyl siding onto the weathered exterior walls.

A sign at the corner of the lot identifies this as a Habitat for Humanity renovation project. "Housing for all God's people," it reads. "No profit. No interest. No government funds." Those are unusual real estate practices. But this is an unusual construction crew, too. It includes a United Methodist pastor, the retired manager of the local electric co-op and one Roman Catholic religious brother, Joe Steen, 52, a Glenmarian of 26 years standing. The house they are renovating will belong to Dan McLaughlin, his wife and their five children.

Brother Joe was a carpenter long before he began his religious vocation. "Building is in my blood," he says. "I just love it. My folks have a picture of me at home with a handsaw that's bigger than I was."

When Joe left his native Chicago to become a Glenmary Brother, he worked on the Glenmary Building Crew, putting up churches, rectories and parish halls all over Appalachia and the South. He also worked with People's Self-Help Housing in Vanceburg, Kentucky.

Today, Brother Joe serves as an associate to Father Steve Pawelk at Saint Francis of Assisi Church in New Albany, Mississippi, and St. Christopher Church in Pontotoc. He combines his vocations for building and Christian service through his work with Habitat for Humanity in both communities.

Joe first learned of Habitat for Humanity during his work on low-income housing in Kentucky. "I volunteered on a few Habitat houses on the side," he said, "just as a busman's holiday."

"Habitat for Humanity was started by a Baptist," Brother Joe says, "a man named Millard Fuller. But it is very much in line with our Catholic social teaching. It stresses the idea of partnership—that people are partners to achieve a common goal—the homeowners and the volunteers. They all give and receive something."

When Brother Joe came to Mississippi in 1997 the Habitat group in New Albany was struggling to get reestablished. Brother Joe began volunteering, and soon Habitat was a large portion of his ministry.

His co-workers testify readily to his contribution. "Joe is one great guy," says Bill Jackson, a retired utility manager. "He does more than any three men. He gets everybody involved in the work. He has made all the difference in the world."

"He's never negative," says Joe Davis, a Habitat board member. "He just says, 'what do we need?' Then he'll go find it. And he is always laughing and joking."

Kenneth Corley, pastor at a Pontotoc Methodist Church, concurs, "He's the life of the party, and very knowledgeable about construction. We just love him to death."

For Brother Joe, his Habitat work is very much a part of his Glenmary mission. "Working on low-income housing is important because the Catholic Church is concerned about the body and the soul-the whole person. It's part of our ministry of social concern. But it is also a form of evangelization, a way to gently bring Catholic teaching to the people of these counties. The Catholic Church here is very small. We don't have a lot of influence. But this is a way to show that our faith is service-oriented and we care about all the people of the county."

That gentle message seems to be getting through. "I had never been involved with the Catholic Church at all before my work with Habitat," says Joe Davis. "I have to say that per person they are the hardest working church in this county."

Konjauwa Williams and her two children (ages six and three) will be the owners of the first new Habitat house in New Albany. She applied for a Habitat house when she saw the sign announcing the project on the vacant lot across the street. "I wanted to get a place while my kids are still little," she says. "So they can grow up in it and not be moving all the time."

"This program doesn't just give you a house," she adds. "I'll have to put in those hours of sweat equity. I can't do heavy construction work. But I can clean up, and I can recruit relatives or friends to do some of the hours. Feeding the volunteers counts, too."

Asked her impressions of Brother Joe Steen, she says, "I'm just so glad someone like him wants to help families. He's really his brother's keeper. It's a good thing when someone gives you a chance to help yourself, and a chance to give something, too."