National Volunteer of the Year Takes to Capitol Hill This Week

ALEXANDRIA, Va.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Participating in AIDS Watch 2008, Catholic Charities USA’s newly named National Volunteer of the Year is on Capitol Hill this week seeking a solid federal commitment to AIDS programs.

Ray Suttles, a volunteer with Catholic Charities of Paterson’s Hope House in New Jersey, was named Catholic Charities USA’s 2008 National Volunteer of the Year today for his compassion, commitment, and energy in working with the marginalized HIV/AIDS population in his community.

“If nothing else, I want the senators and representatives from the state of New Jersey to realize how the pending bills can affect the lives of our clients,” says Suttles of Wharton NJ, when speaking about what he hopes to accomplish through the advocacy efforts. “The clients bring a face, a name, and a story to the legislation.” Improving access to affordable heath care is a key component of Catholic Charities USA’s Campaign to Reduce Poverty in America.

“His role is advocating for clients,” says Diane Silbernagel, executive director of Hope House. “He gives them hope. He absolutely gives them hope. Hope that they have a voice and they will be heard and that they make a difference. Concrete validation that they are important.”

And, to help his HIV/AIDS clients find their voice and learn to advocate on their own behalf, Suttles organized a series of trainings to prepare them to attend the AIDS Watch 2008 this week in Washington, DC, and speak before a congressional panel about HIV funding in 2009.

“Like so many of the volunteers serving Catholic Charities agencies around the country, Ray takes the idea of volunteerism and elevates it to a personal mission,” comments Rev. Larry Snyder, president of Catholic Charities USA. “Ultimately the people that we are serving are in a better place because of Ray’s commitment.”

Fifteen years of volunteer service to Catholic Charities’ Hope House began for Suttles with a simple phone call to a friend. That was how he learned that his college roommate and dear friend, Brad, had AIDS.

“I just felt such a sense that I had to do something,” says the 68-year old Suttles. “I hadn’t paid a lot of attention to AIDS; I didn’t feel like it was something that would invade my world.”

It was while he was deciding how to support his friend, who lived hundreds of miles away, that he discovered Hope House through a referral from his minister. He began to volunteer as an AIDS buddy in 1989, serving those who were facing the illness in their last stage of life. “It was absolutely the most rewarding thing that I’ve done,” says Suttles when reflecting on his experiences with the program. “I was there to just let them talk and to hear them out, in ways that their own friends and family didn’t want to.”

It was through his work at Hope House that Suttles truly saw the effects of the disease close-up. It wasn’t until after his first AIDS buddy, Jimmy, died that he learned how desperate the situation had been. Through the family friend who cared for Jimmy, Suttles learned that the very day when he first connected with them the friend was considering ending both of their lives out of desperation and hopelessness. The confession remains with Suttles and often fills his mind with ‘what ifs.’ He answers them all with a reflection that is the norm for Suttles, “There must have been a guiding force at work, greater than all of us, helping us as we stumbled along.”

Today, Suttles spends about 30 hours each month in voluntary support of the mission and work of Hope House. While the AIDS Buddy program no longer exists, the weekly support group he has facilitated since 1993 for men with HIV/AIDS has absorbed his time.

“The support group is a lifeline,” says Bob Armstrong, who joined the group when he was first diagnosed with AIDS in 1995. “I know that a number of the guys in my group would not be alive without the kind of support that Ray has allowed to happen in the group.”

In addition to his duties with the support group and his advocacy efforts, Suttles volunteers to staff a client advisory board at the agency; oversees the monthly HIV consumer newsletter’ helps with all HIV-related events and fundraisers’ and works with HIV families supporting both parents and children of HIV positive clients. He also volunteers to staff a client advisory board at the agency. He also facilitates an AIDS Resource Roundtable for the local HIV providers to foster collaboration and improved services for clients and volunteers as a member of the Tri-County HIV/AIDS Task Force.

“We are all children of God, all deserving of His love and each other’s love and support,” says Suttles referring to why he continues to volunteer at Hope House. “To give anything less is just not within the teaching that I have learned.”

Suttles will be honored at Catholic Charities USA’s Annual Gathering on Sept. 27 in New Orleans. Volunteers nationwide provide the backbone of the Catholic Charities movement. Collectively, local Catholic Charities agencies rely on more than 263,000 volunteers each year to serve nearly 8 million people of all faiths and diverse needs.