By MARY STADNYK
Associate Editor
UPDATED NOV. 25, 2024
The City of Trenton celebrated Father Brian McCormick and his more than 40 years of service ministering to the poor by renaming the street where the Martin House Community for Justice Foundation sits.
Family members, priests, city and county officials, colleagues, friends, supporters and those who benefited from the many works of Martin House feted Father McCormick with the Nov. 20 unveiling of the “Fr. Brian McCormick Way” street sign at the intersection of Chambers and East State streets. Father McCormick ministered in Trenton’s Wilbur section, one of the city’s poorest, by helping the residents to improve their lives through housing and educational opportunities.
PHOTO GALLERY: Fr. Brian McCormick Way street sign named
“It is truly only with the help of God that one man can accomplish so much and encourage so many people to support a mission of true compassion for those who have less,” said Cathy Dey, a member of St. Gregory the Great Parish, Hamilton Square, who began volunteering with Martin House nearly 20 years ago.
“I say [those who have] less, yet in many, many ways the people I have met, whom I consider friends, have so much more when it comes to their love of God and each other,” said Dey.
Expanding help for Wilbur
Martin House, named after St. Martin de Porres, was founded in 1968 – two years after Father McCormick’s ordination. At the time, race riots were occurring across the nation, including in Trenton. In 1970, Bishop Ahr asked Father McCormick to assume leadership of the Diocese’s Martin House ministry.
While Father McCormick initially dealt with youth and led a Boy Scout troop, he realized he was being called to address the need for decent and affordable family housing. He established Martin House’s Better Community Housing of Trenton, which allowed the diocesan ministry to build homes and offer interest-free mortgages. In 1980 he spearheaded the opening of the Martin House Clothing Store, which operates under the direction of neighborhood residents and sells quality secondhand goods. In 1988, he created the Martin House Family of Programs, which spawned additional outreach programs.
Yasmin J. Brunson Coleman, who was raised in the Wilbur section and was about 12 years old when she became active with the Girls Religion Class at Martin House, recalled Father McCormick and the staff taking the class on visits to area churches, outings and Washington, D.C. “to see the most beautiful Catholic cathedral,” she said, referring to the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception. With time, Coleman’s involvement with Martin House increased to volunteering with Better Community Housing, which taught skills such as painting and putting up sheetrock; taking sewing, art and reading classes; and participating in the summer camp, where she went on to become a counselor and eventually a co-director.
“Father Brian, because of your teaching, we did rise and shine,” Coleman said, noting that others who had participated in Martin House as youth went on to become the Trenton mayor and fire marshal, as well as physicians, nurses, certified nursing aides, an electrician, contractor, corrections officer, chefs, city and county employees, a professional basketball player, and to serve in various branches in the military.
Changing the world with Jesus
Father McCormick said the street-naming ceremony served as a reminder of the vision he had for his priesthood: he “wanted to change the world with Jesus Christ.”
“If nothing else, my time at Martin House taught me how to understand real problems and bring Christian values to help resolve those problems,” said Father McCormick. “It was also about being able to look at the community and see the gifts that exist within that community. Once you recognize and nurture those gifts, you are able to create something much bigger.”
When Father McCormick retired in 2012, Martin House underwent operational changes and was no longer a diocesan-sponsored agency, while the Learning Center has become an operation of the Catholic Youth Organization of Mercer County and is now known as the CYO East State Street Center. The Martin House Foundation now focuses its mission on providing affordable housing and operating the thrift store and Doorway to Hope programs. In retirement, Father McCormick continued to serve the foundation’s staff and board in an advisory capacity and frequently spoke about the Church’s need to be involved in addressing society’s unjust response to the poor.
Pearleen Waters’ 38 years with Martin House initially began in 1986 when she attended a BCHT housing requirement meeting to purchase a home. However, her desire to serve Martin House intensified, and with Father McCormick’s encouragement, she honed skills, became involved with many programs and worked her way to her current administration position as BCHT’s executive director.
“Father Brian’s work was a light in the city of Trenton,” Waters said, and that naming a street after him was indicative that “his work is part of Trenton’s history.”
Father McCormick smiles after unveiling the new street sign named in his honor. Marianne Hartman photo