This article was written by Lisa Pevtzow and appeared in National Catholic Register on April 14, 1996

Vincent Pescatore's letters home conveyed the lushness, the heat and the deadly beauty of a country where whole families could be made to disappear in the night. What really animated his writing, however, were the thumb-nail sketches of life among the Guatemalan poor. There was Yam, for example, the skinny six-year-old son of a prostitute. Or Claudia, 11, who reminded Pescatore of a Guatemalan Becky Sharp.

The children he described had found succor thanks to Farm of the Child, an organization that runs a refuge located in the Petén rain forest, six hours from the nearest phone and a full day via river raft, bus and turbo-prop plane from Guatemala City. The organization has rescued hundreds of Indian children since being founded by Pescatore and his wife, Zulena, nearly eight years ago. It has made a home for the malnourished, the illiterate and the psychologically scarred. The project also supports a medical clinic, a primary school and a vocational school specializing in econo-tourism and agriculture.

But now there are no more letters from Pescatore. In January, a plane carrying Pescatore and two fellow workers crashed into a Honduran mountainside 10 miles from its destination. After learning of her husband's death, Zulena said through her tears that the Farm of the Child project would go on. "It's God's work and it must continue," she said.

Pescatore seems to have felt the same way. "The children call it their home and will remember it as their home when they grow up," he said shortly before the crash. And Farm of the Child, he added, never turned away anyone for lack of space. There are 200,000 homeless children in Guatemala; they are victims of broken homes, abuse and political violence. Sadly, Pescatore once explained, out on the street they were better off than in poorly financed government institutions known for their inadequate food and depressing atmosphere.

Farm of the Child offers a substitute family that takes the place of the extended family of aunts and grandparents and cousins. Many come scared, he said malnourished and suffering from a variety of diseases. The good reputation of the orphanage has led many poverty-stricken parents to leave their offspring in the mistake hope that Farm of the Child will raise them and return them when they're old enough to work.

The working farm teaches the children to raise livestock and grow corn and vegetables; there's a fresh supply of beef, turkey and chicken on the dinner table. "We work thriftily, humbly and frugally," Pescatore explained. "In most foreign-sponsored orphanages, the children live like millionaires with ready access to vehicles, hot showers, and videos. They live better than the kings of society." "Such conditions often led to resentment and apathy among the Guatemalans, he explained. "They become so accustomed to American money coming down the pipeline that they don't think the poor are their responsibility."

Pescatore never imagined he'd spend his days helping orphans in the rain forests of Latin America. He gave up an auditing career with Price Waterhouse and thought of becoming a Franciscan priest. But he was unsure of his vocation and struck out on bicycle from Norway to Austria, hoping for discernment along the way. Nothing happened, so his spiritual adviser suggested he go to Guatemala to work with poor children. Still unsure, Vincent Pescatore made a deal with God; he would make the acquaintance of every pretty girl in sight, and if he fell in love, he would assume God had given him the vocation of marriage. He met his future wife waiting in line at a candied apple stand.

When no world organization showed interest in the couple's dream of founding a center for the children of poor farmers, Pescatore set up his own in 1987. A little more than a year ago, he donated it to a local religious order, the Daughters of St. Joseph. All along, he'd intended to eventually turn the institution over to trusted local hands.

With 22 acres made available by the Trujillo municipality along the Caribbean coast of Honduras, Pescatore uprooted his wife and five children and built another school and children's home.

On Jan. 3, Vincent left Trujillo to pick up two men who had volunteered to help build the chapel roof. It was the rainy season and their plane apparently went down in a storm. The next day, a commercial jet detected the emergency-landing transmitter near Trujillo. Two days later, the US Embassy called Zulena with news that there had been no survivors.

In his last letter home, Pescatore wrote of the corruption of local Honduran officials eager to confiscate the land, while also reporting on progress in providing healthcare for the poor of the region. His commitment never wavered.

"We continue to build for the children of Honduras," he wrote, "roofs to shelter them, families to raise them, schools to educate them, and justice to guard them."