c. 2004 Religion News Service

POMPTON PLAINS, N.J. (RNS) At Rosemary McSorley’s law office, pictures of religious tableaus adorn the walls next to bar meeting notices and quotes by Martin Luther King Jr.

The legal advice here is cheap by trade standards. If you like, McSorley also will pray with you. And every session ends with a bear hug. All this is not completely surprising considering her law office is one of the few in the country to be run by a Roman Catholic nun.

McSorley, a 72-year-old ball of energy who has a deep laugh and rarely sits down, operates Cornelian Community Counselors out of a blue-sided Cape Cod across the street from the local high school. A stone statute of the Virgin Mary sits in the backyard near a driveway that is often cramped with clients’ cars.

The house is owned by the nearby church, Our Lady of Good Counsel. It is also the parish’s convent where McSorley lives with her cat, Crystal. With the blessing of the church, she converted the dank and dark basement into a law office with three computers, a copy machine and bulging file cabinets. The office handles about 100 cases a year.

The Cornelian Community Counselors provide low-cost legal help to people in four counties.

“The gap in New Jersey between available legal services and the cases that require help is huge,” McSorley said. “I look at it as a ministry.”

The office opened in 1995, with a helping hand from the church and her religious order, the Sisters of the Holy Child Jesus. And while the law office is not officially connected to the Archdiocese of Paterson, two of its bishops helped McSorley get money for law school when, at the age of 55, she decided to learn a new, more practical, skill.

“I’m not a saint. I’m just trying to help people with the law. … I have proof in the list in the computer of people that we have served, I think that’s what God was asking of me in this time of my life,” she said.

McSorley, two lay lawyers, a receptionist and student volunteers from Seton Hall University School of Law in Newark handle cases ranging from helping women with custody problems and child-support issues, to assisting immigrants in getting proper documentation, and helping the elderly secure medical benefits.

While McSorley will offer pastoral services to her clients, she does not advertise her religious affiliation or require clients to attend her church or any other. She doesn’t wear a habit and when she introduces herself to clients or a judge she never includes the title “sister” before her name.

She also takes on some issues, such as divorce cases, that many view as contrary to Catholic teachings. Her focus is on the children, she said, because parents who are trapped in bad relationships do not have happy families.

“I’m doing something good for the people. I don’t have a consciousness problem with it at all,” she said.

Her path to legal practice began with an effort to help a woman who was trying to escape an abusive husband. The woman moved into the convent, eventually causing the pastor to order the woman to a shelter so she would qualify for public assistance. In retrospect, the nun said getting the woman to a safe place was important, but she needed more help than the nun could provide.

“My charity was misguided,” she said. She wanted to find a new way to provide help.

McSorley is the youngest of 15 children _ eight of whom became members of the clergy. But the law is also in her roots. Her father was a Philadelphia attorney.

“The answer was right in front of me,” she said.

In 1987, with the help of scholarships influenced by two bishops, she enrolled at Seton Hall law. She took her first cases in 1993 before the Cornelian Community Counselors was incorporated.

McSorley’s office is one of a growing number of faith-based, nonprofit legal organizations opening around the country and across religions. Lawyers who do this kind of work say they see it as their religious mission to do community service by fostering justice.

Some say the growth is in response to a changing society. The Washington, D.C.-based Catholic Legal Immigration Network started in 1988 with a few offices. Now, it has about 250 across the country, spokesman Scott Christenson said, because there are more immigrants and the legal issues they confront are more complex.

Other faith-based legal aid organizations have formed to help the working poor who make too much money to qualify for traditional legal aid, yet still can’t afford an attorney.

“We were trying to target the people who were cafeteria workers and bus drivers,” said Sister Linda Pepe, a paralegal at The Communities Law Center in Hartford, Conn. “There is an extraordinary need for nonprofit law centers to help people who don’t know whether they are coming or going in the legal system. … I get calls from people who are looking for services and have absolutely no place to turn.”

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McSorley’s clients say she is a natural advocate and the help she provides is a blessing. Not only does the nun help them navigate the courts, but she also will get them donated mattresses, clothing, furniture or loan them a few dollars.

The sister recently helped nursing assistant Taleesa Moultrie, 30, of Paterson, get child support payments for her five kids from her ex-husband.

“I thought I had nothing. I thought I was nothing. I had lost all faith in justice,” Moultrie said. “She made me believe in myself.”

MO/JL END COSCARELLI