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Posted on Sun, Dec. 24, 2006

Miami Notre Dame d'Haiti Catholic Church gets a major donation from a businessman

LITTLE HAITI: Struggling church gets major donation

A Miami businessman has given a deprived church its largest donation to date, helping the Haitian community move one step closer to constructing a new building.

Santa Claus has come early to Notre Dame d'Haiti Catholic Church.

Arun Krishna Puri, a Miami real estate developer, gave $300,000 to church officials last Friday, boosting a flagging campaign to build a new church with its largest donation ever.

Over the past quarter century, Haitians have worshipped at Notre Dame, whose main sanctuary is a former school cafeteria.

Thomas Wenski, the Bishop of Orlando, who co-founded Notre Dame, created the church to give Haitians a place of their own. He established English classes and began a social services center where people still flock for legal help, healthcare and day-care services and literacy classes.

Notre Dame is the spiritual and cultural hub of Little Haiti, and it has outgrown its current building.

The parish has struggled in the past 18 months to raise $1.5 million that would be combined with money from the Archdiocese of Miami to build a new church.

But many of the church's 4,200 parishioners are elderly and on fixed incomes, said the Rev. Reginald Jean-Mary, the church administrator. A Miami Herald analysis of U.S. Census data in 2005 showed that 40 percent of people in Little Haiti are poor.

Jean-Mary is expected to discuss the donation tonight at midnight Mass. He announced the gift at the church's 25th anniversary Mass last Sunday, but had not disclosed any details.

''One thing that I always believe is that God provides,'' he said Saturday during a telephone interview. ``The gift is a confirmation that God is working with us. The community has been praying that God will bless this project.''

Puri made the gift in honor of his mother. He does not want to comment on his recent actions, preferring instead to stay out of the spotlight, Jean-Mary said. The donor currently is in New Delhi, India, caring for his ailing mother, who suffers from Alzheimer's disease.

According to Tom Equels, a Miami trial lawyer, who facilitated the donation, Puri, 60, made his fortune from real estate and the sale of successful clothing lines in Europe. He worked with Equels' father while he was studying accounting in college. He later spent so much time at the Equels' home that now he is considered part of the family.

Equels became involved with Notre Dame in the early 1980s when he was general counsel to the Southern Christian Leadership Council, a coalition of churches and synagogues founded in 1957 by Martin Luther King Jr. The council worked with Wenski and sued the federal government to open Krome Detention Center so that local clergy could offer religious services to Haitian refugees. The first Mass took place Christmas Day in 1981 or 1982, he said.

''Over the years, I've always been willing to help when there was a problem in the church,'' he said.

He suspected his friend felt the same way. By late October, Equels showed Puri a video of Jericho, a weeklong spiritual revival that drew thousands of people to Notre Dame earlier that month. Puri saw parishioners singing, chanting and praising God while swaying to Afro-Caribbean rhythms.

''The point I made to Puri is that if every church, synagogue and mosque around had the spirit within Notre Dame, then the world would be paradise,'' he said.

Notre Dame strains to accommodate the 1,200 people who attend services at each Mass. It uses its parking lot as a second chapel where people hear Mass through speakers. The church offers five Masses in Creole and French every weekend.

A new church, parish hall and community center is expected to cost $4 million, Jean-Mary said. With the donation, the community still needs to raise $300,000 before construction can start.

The new church is expected to house 1,500 people. The main sanctuary is expected to become a parish hall and community center, named after Puri's mother, Chander Mukhi Puri. The center will house a pavilion for the elderly where they can gather for classes, workshops, healthcare checkups and social activities with the younger members of the congregation, Jean-Mary said.

Rosenny Augustine, 16, of Miami, who has attended Notre Dame since birth, said she was surprised by the donation.

'I'm overjoyed. My heart is singing. I can't think of all the words to express my happiness. People have been saying, `I've been giving money, but when is the new church going to be built?' We're almost there.''

Equels hints that there is even more to come.

''Puri is going to give additional money to this project. This is the beginning of a relationship,'' he said. After visiting the church and meeting its parishioners, Puri made a large contribution. Equels believes his friend was motivated to help because of a vision of the world both men share.

`'We build the church one person and one miracle at a time.''