Our Mission
Rooted in the Gospel, Catholic Charities of Idaho shares God’s love with all in need by providing services and programs that support human well-being.
Our Vision
To love and strengthen Idaho
one person at a time.
About Us
Catholic Charities of Idaho offers a variety of social services that improve lives, promote dignity, and build individual and family self-sufficiency. Founded in 2000, we prioritize service to those most in need, advance healthy family life and stable relationships, offer culturally competent services to newcomer communities, and foster safety, trust, collaboration, and empowerment as the key guiding principles of our work with clients.
Catholic Charities is a faith based social service organization founded on the social teachings of the Roman Catholic Church. We offer high quality family and individual counseling services, immigration legal services, educational, skill building, and financial wellness services, and resource linkage, referral and support services. We strive to ensure service integration and care coordination for all we assist. We seek partnership, collaboration, and association with those who share our values and mission of service.
Catholic Charities receives support from the generosity of donors, parishes, the annual Diocesan Catholic Appeal, the Idaho Catholic Foundation, grants, foundations and fundraising efforts. We offer services to all people, regardless of religion, age, gender, disability, race/ethnicity, income or background.
Catholic
Social Teaching
Catholic Charities of Idaho’s mission is rooted in the seven principles of Catholic Social Teaching, an ever-growing body of official Church documents that articulate the social message of the Gospel and lay a framework for how Catholics should put the principles of their faith into daily, faith-filled action on behalf of the Gospel.
“The Church's social teaching is a rich treasure of wisdom about building a just society and living lives of holiness amid the challenges of modern society.”
United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB)
Belief in the inherent dignity of the human person is the foundation of all Catholic Social Teaching. Human life is sacred, and the dignity of the human person is the starting point for a moral vision for society. This principle is grounded in the idea that the person is made in the image of God. The person is the clearest reflection of God among us.
The human person is both sacred and social. We realize our dignity and rights in relationship with others, in community. Human beings grow and achieve fulfillment in community. How we organize our society — in economics and politics, in law and policy — directly affects human dignity and the capacity of individuals to grow in community. The obligation to “love our neighbor” has an individual dimension, but it also requires a broader social commitment. Everyone has a responsibility to contribute to the good of the whole society, to the common good.
Human dignity can be protected and a healthy community can be achieved only if human rights are protected and responsibilities are met. Every person has a fundamental right to life and a right to those things required for human decency – starting with food, shelter, clothing, employment, health care and education. Corresponding to these rights are duties and responsibilities — to one another, to our families and to the larger society.
The moral test of a society is how it treats its most vulnerable members. The poor have the most urgent moral claim on the conscience of the nation. We are called to look at public policy decisions in terms of how they affect the poor. The “option for the poor” is not an adversarial slogan that pits one group or class against another. Rather it states that the deprivation and powerlessness of the poor wounds the whole community. A healthy community can be achieved only if its members give special attention to those with special needs, to those who are poor and on the margins of society.
The economy must serve people, not the other way around. Work is more than a way to make a living; it is a form of continuing participation in God’s creation. If the dignity of work is to be protected, then the basic rights of workers must be respected – the right to productive work, to decent and fair wages, to the organization and joining of unions, to private property and to economic initiative.
We are one human family, whatever our national, racial, economic and ideological differences. We are our brothers’ and sisters’ keepers, wherever they may be. Since loving our neighbor has global dimensions in a shrinking world, we are called to work globally for peace and justice.
The goods of the earth are gifts from God, and they are intended by God for the benefit of everyone. There is a “social mortgage” that guides our use of the world’s goods, and we have a responsibility to care for these goods as stewards and trustees, not as mere consumers and users. How we treat the environment is a measure of our stewardship, a sign of our respect for the Creator. We are called to protect people and the planet, living our faith in relationship with all of God’s creation.
CCI Staff
Program Administration
Eddie Trask
Executive Director
Shea Symons
Controller and Office Manager
Shyla Rankin
Donor Relations Manager
Ellen Lawless
Front Desk Representative
Jessica Valerio
Donor Relations
Administrative Assistant
Faith-Based Counseling
Matthew Geske
Counseling Director
Allison Brandt
Clinical Counselor
Jodi Goettemoeller
Clinical Counselor
Christine Hover
Clinical Counselor
David Lach
Clinical Counselor
Maria Biggi
Counseling Intern
Fr. Onyema Okorie
Counseling Intern
Immigration Legal Services
Cynthia Sibrian
Immigration Program Manager
Mariza Muñoz
DOJ Accredited Representative
Martha Alejandre
DOJ Accredited Representative
Kandie Talavera
Immigration Case Coordinator
Social Services
Kayla Eachus
Social Services Program Manager
Julie Hart
Social Services Supervisor
Esmeralda Huerigo
Services Coordinator
Kirstin Heffner, Chair
Sacred Heart, Boise
Andrea Horton, Secretary
St. Mark's, Boise
Jon Morris, Treasurer
St. John's Cathedral, Boise
Fr. John Kucera
Priest in Residence
St. Mary’s, Boise
Todd McCurry
Risen Christ, Boise
Deacon Chris Stewart
St. Pius X, Coeur d'Alene
Peggy Minnaert
St. John's Cathedral, Boise
Christy Neuhoff
St. Mary's, Boise
Bruce Olenick
Holy Spirit, Pocatello
Oscar Sanchez
St. John's Cathedral, Boise
Christian Welp
Diocese of Boise
Board of Directors
Most Reverend Peter F. Christensen,
M.A., D.D., President
Bishop of Boise, St. John's Cathedral
Bishop Christensen was ordained to the priesthood on May 25, 1985 by Archbishop John Roach and served as associate pastor of St. Olaf Parish in Minneapolis before becoming spiritual director (1989) and rector (1991) of St. John Vianney Seminary. In June of 1999 he was appointed pastor of Nativity of Our Lord Parish in St. Paul where he served until being named the 10th Bishop of Superior on June 28, 2007 by His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI. On November 4, 2014, Pope Francis named Bishop Christensen as the eighth bishop in the Diocese of Boise, Idaho.
Immigration Legal Services
Cynthia Sibrian
Immigration Program Manager
Mariza Muñoz
DOJ Accredited Representative
Martha Alejandre
DOJ Accredited Representative
Kandie Talavera
Immigration Case Coordinator
Social Services
Kayla Eachus
Social Services Program Manager
Julie Hart
Social Services Supervisor
Esmeralda Huerigo
Services Coordinator
Aya Bakeman
Services Coordinator
Counseling
Matthew Geske
Counseling Director
Allison Brandt
Clinical Counselor
Jodi Goettemoeller
Clinical Counselor
Christine Hover
Clinical Counselor
David Lach
Clinical Counselor
Maria Biggi
Clinical Counselor
CCI Staff
Program Administration
Eddie Trask
Executive Director
Shea Symons
Controller and Office Manager
Shyla Rankin
Donor Relations Manager
Ellen Lawless
Front Desk Representative
