CRS aid worker Jacques Montouroy shows Haitians in a makeshift tent camp how to cut washers from rubber tubing a few weeks after the country's devastating earthquake. (CNS/Lane Hartill, Catholic Relief Services)
Catholic Relief Services lost a true humanitarian July 29 in the person of Jacques Montouroy.
He died from complications from an ulcer, according to CRS. He was 63.
In his 41 years with the U.S .bishops’ overseas relief and development agency, “Papa Jacques,” as he was known, worked in some of the most God-forsaken places on earth under extremely difficult conditions: Haiti after the January earthquake, Burundi, Liberia, Sierra Leone and Somalia in their wars. Yet he persisted in meeting the needs of others in the face of overwhelming obstacles.
Lane Hartill, regional information office for CRS in West Africa, writes about the life of his colleague in a post on CRS Voices, the agency’s blog. His reflection on Montouroy depicts a man whose life was rooted in Gospel values as he tried to serve the poorest and most forgotten people of the world.
Montouroy never married. His family was the people he served and the people he worked with. Hartill says Montouroy never sought the spotlight and never liked to have his picture taken.
From the sound of it, he surely will be missed.
Filed under: CNS
