CHARLOTTE — The Catholic Campaign for Human Development (CCHD) is one of the Church’s primary means of fighting poverty at the grassroots level, both here in the Diocese of Charlotte and across the United States.
The annual collection, which will be taken up Nov. 20-21, is a source of both national and local funds to support organizations that address the root causes of poverty in America. Seventy-five percent of the funds collected go to the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops to support national grant funding, and the other 25 percent remains here in the diocese to fund local anti-poverty efforts.
Since 1970, CCHD has funded some 4,000 programs across the United States.
Local CCHD funds are distributed to local non-profit organizations through Catholic Charities Diocese of Charlotte’s CCHD Program. Grants of up to $5,000 are awarded to non-profit organizations fighting poverty across the diocese.
Morganton-based Material Return is a national CCHD grant recipient. As an employee-owned enterprise, it is playing a key role in reviving the manufacturing sector in the foothills region of North Carolina. It transforms reclaimed textiles for sustainable use and provides waste aggregation services that keep post-production textile remnants out of landfills. It also researches ways to return textile waste back into the supply chain, by helping client businesses create products and fibers from the waste material rather than discarding it. Material Return also manufactures its own brand of circular yarn made from textile waste called ReturnTex™, which is used in products sold by varied manufacturers that are part of the Carolina Textile District. 
Applications for the diocese’s 2022 grants are due Feb. 15. Each grant award winner partners in some way with a parish or entity of the diocese familiar with the work of the non-profit, and the parish provides a letter of endorsement with their grant application.
Supporting the Catholic Campaign for Human Development collection assists enterprises such as Material Return which are “Working on the Margins” to provide innovative, life-improving solutions in their communities.
World Day of the Poor
The 2021 World Day of the Poor will be recognized Nov. 14. The theme this year is “The Poor You Will Always Have With You.”
Pope Francis established the World Day of the Poor in his apostolic letter “Misericordia et Misera,” issued on Nov. 20, 2016, to celebrate the end of the Extraordinary Jubilee of Mercy.
In Pope Francis’ message for this year’s World Day of the Poor, he appeals to us “never to turn our backs on poverty for a series of reasons that are ethical, moral, pastoral, political, economic and social,” says Archbishop Rino Fisichella, president of the Pontifical Council for Promoting the New Evangelization.
The Holy Father will celebrate Mass for the World Day of the Poor on Nov. 14 in St. Peter’s Basilica.
— SueAnn Howell, senior reporter. Joe Purello contributed.
Learn More
At www.ccdoc.org/cchdcrs: Find out more information about the Catholic Charities’ CCHD Local Grants Program.
Read the Holy Father’s message for the 2021 World Day of the Poor.