ARTICLES

Twins join grandmother in rebuilding New Orleans

By Steve Neill
Of The Catholic Virginian

Both Kristin and Rachel Paccione, identical twins who are now second year medical students at different medical schools in Virginia, have long given credit to their paternal grandmother for being a strong influence in their lives regarding their Catholic faith.

Their 78-year-old grandmother, Elizabeth Paccione, a member of Blessed Sacrament parish in Margate, NJ, is known affectionately to her eight grandchildren as “Nonna,” a common Italian name for “Grandma.”

Through Mrs. Paccione’s influence, her two granddaughters joined her in a volunteer rebuilding effort known as Rebuild New Orleans, a program in which people spend a period of time working on houses devastated by Hurricane Katrina.

“I think with my faith in general, I feel a call to help people in need,” Rachel told The Catholic Virginian. “This was an opportunity that came to be because my grandmother found it and asked both of us to do it with her.”

Both Kristin and Rachel, now 26, grew up in Richmond and were part of St. Mary’s parish where their parents and younger brother still are parishioners. As students at Mills Godwin High School, they became members of the Tuckahoe Vounteer Rescue Squad with the then distant hope of becoming physicians.

After they graduated in 2003 from the University of Virginia where they both were Echols Scholars, they began medical studies. Kristin is at VCU School of Medicine in Richmond, formerly known as Medical College of Virginia, and Rachel is at Eastern Virginia Medical School in Norfolk. They both are members of St. Patrick’s parish in Richmond.

The rebuilding trip to New Orleans was called Project One and took place in June. It was sponsored by Catholic Charities of the Diocese of Camden.

“We went with my grandmother’s diocese because the diocese subsidized the trip,” Kristin said. “Except for Rachel and me, everyone else was from the Diocese of Camden.”

A cousin, who is a sophomore at La Salle University in Philadelphia, was also part of the group.

The twins pointed out they are familiar with southern New Jersey because their father grew up there and they often stayed with their grandparents during the summer and became involved in her parish.

The volunteer rebuilders stayed in a Catholic school in New Orleans, sleeping in classrooms which had been converted to dormitory-style rooms. They took showers in the gym locker rooms.

“It was very, very hot,” Kristin said.

“They first gave us a tour of New Orleans so we could see the destruction,” she explained. “The lower ninth ward is pretty much gutted and no rebuilding is going on.

“We were in the upper ninth ward where there is rebuilding.

“The first two days we were cleaning up the work site,” she said, adding that it was a house in which an older woman had lived.

Chores involved hauling lumber, hauling tools, putting on finishing touches by hanging doors, hanging cabinets “and a lot of painting.”

“The final day the whole team was brought to a new location,” Kristin continued. “In one day we had to move everything out and gut the entire house.

“We took out the floors and the walls. We gutted the whole house basically down to the studs.”

Younger members of the team sometimes became concerned about Mrs. Paccione who worked diligently throughout the day.

“My grandmother was by far the oldest in the group,” Kristin said. “People had to stop her and make her take a break.”

Both twins who went all through school, including college, together are now separated in medical school. They see this as positive. They view medical school as fiercely competitive and feel that having a sibling in the same small size class could alienate one from other students.

“This is the first time in our lives where people don’t know we have a twin,” Kristin said. “People know you for who you are.”

Their grandmother’s influence on their lives has made a lasting impression.

“My ‘Nonna’ is the biggest one who has inspired my Catholic faith,” Kristin asserted. “I have learned through her the need to help others.

“Being in New Orleans with her was like a culmination in which I could say to her ‘This is what you have instilled in me and this is what I hope to exemplify as an adult in my career of medicine.”

Kristin’s career goal is pediatrics with a specialty in oncology and cardiology. Rachel is considering pediatrics or intensive care.

They both plan on doing missionary work as doctors after they graduate from medical school in 2010.

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