On February 28 at the central office of Food For The Poor (FFP) in Port-au-Prince in the presence of several high dignitaries and personalities, the ceremony was held to receive the relics of Venerable Pierre Toussaint, one of the first Haitian philanthropists.

Pierre Toussaint was born a slave in Saint-Marc on June 27, 1766 and died in New York, free on June 30, 1853. He was declared Venerable in 1966 by Saint John Paul II leaving behind a reputation as benefactor, goodness personified and of total devotion to the needy. In 1989, his remains were exhumed and then transported to St Patrick's Cathedral in Manhattan, where he remains the only layman and only black to date.

Doctor Maryse Prezeau, without whom this event could not have taken place, is the one who donated the relics of the Venerable. One of his colleagues, Dr. Spencer Turkel, was one of five local anthropologists invited by the Archdiocese of New York to exhume the remains of Pierre Toussaint. Professor Turkel, knowing that she was Haitian, had collected part of the remains contained in the vault which he had put in an urn and given to her. She was therefore in possession of part of the remains of one of the first Haitian saints. Following an exchange with the leaders of Food for the Poor, she spontaneously decided to bequeath them to FFP, with all the scientific and archaeological certificates of use, so that they rest in Haiti.

IH/ iciHaiti