A Mission that Resonates

Meet our donor John Folse

John Folse’s experience with the School Sisters of Notre Dame began when he was called to visit with two sisters from St. Michael Special School in New Orleans. A fellow co-worker, Chef Warren LeRuth, had started an event entitled “Chefs’ Charity for Children,” with all proceeds benefitting St. Michaels. As Chef LeRuth’s health began to fail, he entrusted John with the task of making sure the event continued. After John met with the SSNDs who taught at the school, he knew he had met a special group of people.

“I came to realize that the School Sisters of Notre Dame devote their entire lives to the Church and to the special causes that they choose,” he said. “Once you experience what happens in these exceptional places, you cannot help but continue to be a part of it.”

John has prepared meals for important events at St. Mary of the Pines in Chatawa, Mississippi, for the last several years. He and his team from White Oak Plantation in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, drive to Chatawa for Jubilee and the Mass of Appreciation, making and serving delicious gourmet meals for sisters and donors. For John, it’s the sisters’ mission that resonates with him.

“Their mission to educate in a Catholic environment while nourishing students’ faith lives is so necessary, not just to our immediate communities but to the world,” he explained. “The sisters are so content having so little and offering their entire lives to the Lord and educating His children.”

The mission of education speaks to John, who opened the Chef John Folse Culinary Institute at Nicholls State University in Thibodaux, Louisiana. He has also released many cookbooks as part of Chef John Folse & Company Publishing and has won numerous awards as part of his culinary research team. He credits his success with the gifts that God has bestowed upon him and feels the sisters’ help bring those gifts to the forefront.

“Each of us is born with special skills that ultimately become our trade, our business or our vocation,” he said. “If successful, we immerse ourselves completely into our work without the purpose of money or prestige. The sisters devote their total lives to serving others and, ultimately, God. These sisters are awe-inspiring, and they will inspire you, too.”

To learn more about Chef John Folse, visit www.jfolse.com.

Story featured in donor newsletter Vol. 1 2018.

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