A church of loving neighbors:

Kentucky project, other outside relationships uplift local communities of faith

Margaret Gabriel

A truck from St. Barbara Church in Harrison City, Pa., has arrived in eastern Kentucky one day during the third week of the month for nearly 15 years. Beginning in 2006, the truck arrived at Queen of All Saints in Beattyville, and since 2015 at Good Shepherd in Campton. The truck is loaded with food for families and goods that will be sold at the Good Shepherd thrift store.
“When we started the program, we thought it was just about food, but we’ve learned that it’s really about relationships,” said Barb Kustra, a parishioner of St. Barbara, who makes the journey with her husband, Al.

“The families from Pennsylvania really take the time to make connections with the families here,” said Franciscan Sister Susan Marie Pleiss, parish life director at Good Shepherd. “They make it a point to celebrate graduations and other milestones in the lives of the families. You can see the genuineness of the relation- ships they have formed with people who have backgrounds that are different from theirs.”

Local Lifeblood

The longtime Pennsylvania-Kentucky relationship began when the Kustras were touched by a mission talk by Franciscan Sister Amy Kistner, then a pastoral associate in the Diocese of Lexington. Sister Kistner’s stories about her relationships with families in eastern Kentucky motivated the couple to reach out to families in the area and to encourage others in their parish to do the same.

They were particularly moved by stories of children who sometimes drop out of school because of a lack of clothes and school sup- plies. Sister Kistner introduced the Kustras to Franciscan Sister Alice Retzner, pastoral associate of Queen of All Saints Church in Lee County at that time, and a bond between the Beattyville and Pennsylvania parishes started. A collection of school supplies by St. Barbara Church in the summer of 2006 was followed by a coat drive. The drives prompted parishioners to do even more.

Five members of the Harrison City parish adopted four Beattyville families and collected a week’s worth of food for each family. It was delivered during the last week of the month when, they learned, money and food stamps often ran short. After nearly 15 years of continual service, the St. Barbara Kentucky Project connects more than 100 people from the Pennsylvania parish to 22 families in Lee and Wolfe counties.

Creating relationships is the heart of the project, and the Kustras have also created a relationship with the Christian Layman Corps (CLC) in Greensburg, Pa. The Kentucky Project borrows the CLC’s box truck for its trips to Campton and on the way home they stop to load a donation of mattresses from Imperial Bedding in Charleston, W.V. The couple enjoys their ability to repay the kindness of the CLC in allowing them to borrow the truck. The mattresses they load in Charleston are given to families in crisis by the CLC.

The connection between the Pennsylvania and Kentucky parishes is one of several perennial relationships with groups and entities from outside the diocese that have been cultivated for many years with supporters of mountain churches. Holy Trinity in Harlan hosts volunteers from the Capuchin Appalachian Mission every year; more than a dozen parish- es provide support to St. Vincent Mission in David, Ky.; parishioners from Transfiguration Church in Rochester, N.Y., make an annual retreat to Holy Family Church in Booneville, where they also work on home repair projects in Owsley County.

Built on Relationship

When Sister Retzner took semi-retirement and moved from Beattyville to Campton, the Kentucky Project decided to continue serving the families they were supporting in Beattyville, but when it was time to add families, they would select them from Campton and Wolfe County.

“We felt a real connection to Sister Alice [who died Feb. 6] and now we feel that connection to Sister Susan,” Kustra said.

One of the most anticipated days of the year in Campton is the “Penn-tucky Reunion,” which celebrates the years-long relationship.

“Years ago, Al wanted to have a Thanksgiving dinner, so we could give folks fresh food,” Barb said. Because November presented travel difficulties, the reunion was scheduled in April as a natural outgrowth of the groups’ deepening relationship.

Although the reunion was cancelled in the wake of the pandemic in 2020, it is already on the calendar for April 2021. The Kustras and about 25 other St. Barbara parishioners will prepare food for 100 people or more — members of the 22 sponsored families, including moms and dads, kids, grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins.

“We’ve grown as family and we’ve seen kids grow up,” Al said. “The last time we were there, one of the families was driving away and a little girl said, ‘Dad, stop! I forgot to give Al a hug!’”

The reunion takes place at Happy Top, a picnic spot in Breathitt County. In addition to the meal, there is a bouncy house and crafts for the kids and the teenagers play basketball on an outdoor court. Al Kustra, an amateur photographer, takes family portraits as Christmas gifts. “One man gave me a bear hug and told me that picture was the best Christmas present he had ever gotten,” Al said.