For my house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples. (Is 56:7)

Forty years ago my grandmother and I attended the ordination of a friend, Father Ted Hochstatter, at the Cathedral of Peoria, Illinois. The next day Father Ted celebrated a Mass of Thanksgiving at the country church that his grandparents built. It was a remarkable Mass because the music was provided by a deaf choir where Father Ted had worked. In addition, the entire Mass was presented in Sign Language. Father Ted met Mother Teresa in Rome in 1990, and in 1993, kneeling before Mother Teresa, Fr. Ted promised whole-hearted, free service to the “poorest of the poor,” to take no salary, keep no savings, and have nothing of his own. To this day, Fr. Ted is still working with the Missionaries of Charity, the order that Mother Teresa started. He has served the Missionaries of Charity in Rome, USA, Haiti, Albania, Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania and Ethiopia. For the past 20 years, Father Ted has worked among the “poorest of the poor” in Kenya and East Africa. Father Ted works every day to make God’s house, "a house of prayer for all peoples," especially for the “poorest of the poor.” His webpage is frtedskids.org.