Posted on 12/16/2009 5:52:00 AM PST by marshmallow
Thomas Rutkoski is dying, and he knows it. But as he tries an experimental treatment to battle his cancer, his thoughts turn to children thousands of miles away.
"Yes, I'm going to die of cancer someday, but I know kids who are dying because they don't have a slice of bread," said Rutkoski, 66, of Evans City in Butler County.
Rutkoski is founder of Abode for Children, an Evans City nonprofit that runs two orphanages in India and Nigeria. In between cancer treatments at the Hillman Cancer Center, he is preparing for a fundraiser at 6 p.m. Saturday at the Churchill Valley Country Club. At the banquet he will give the Don Bosco Award, named for the patron saint of orphans, to former Pirates infielder Freddy Sanchez.
Sanchez is being honored for donating $50,000 to the Miracle League Field, a sports facility for handicapped children in Cranberry. The banquet, along with Rutkoski's books and speeches, supports his orphanages, which serve about 1,000 children.
"Without Tom's support and orphan sponsors, these kids would have nothing," said Mark DeAndrea, 53, of Scott, Rutkoski's friend and the former vice president of the group. "He supplies a value-based education, food and clothing, and everything a kid needs to grow up and be successful."
Rutkoski, a former chief photojournalist for KDKA-TV, started Abode about three years ago as an offshoot of Gospa Missions, another nonprofit group he founded.
He said he felt the need to help children because, as a young man, he drove three then-girlfriends to an abortion clinic after they became pregnant with his child. He has no children of his own.
"I'm saying to God that I'm so sorry for taking part in that destruction of life that I will dedicate my entire life to helping children," Rutkoski said.
(Excerpt) Read more at pittsburghlive.com ...
Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans...in their distress...
James 1:27
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