On the cusp of 80, Mary Jo Copeland is unwavering

She was widowed, she survived the height of the pandemic and she isn’t going anywhere. Checking in with the high-profile founder of Sharing and Caring Hands.

It’s 10:05 on a Wednesday morning, and 200 people stream into the vaulted cafeteria at Sharing and Caring Hands in downtown Minneapolis. Half head toward the breakfast buffet, and the other half line up to meet with Mary Jo Copeland. They need money, they need bus passes, they need vouchers, they need glasses, they need shoes. And — once they speak with her, they realize — they need her prayers.

She sits in the corner of the sun-drenched room rimmed with sculpted butterflies, a small figure with a big presence, a humble worker and a celebrity-saint. She will be the arbiter of their requests, and this morning, the 79-year-old is ready to do business — Post-Its at her left, rosaries on her right.

“I got robbed when I fell asleep at the bus stop,” a middle-aged woman tells Mary Jo.

Mary Jo gives her a bus pass and a purple rosary. “You better keep it with you!” she says.

She is decisive, pondering each query and making a decision in seconds. She offers $10 for laundry detergent, $20 for gas and a Visa card for insulin. She is unapologetic, telling one woman that her tennis shoes are just fine and declining a request for a cellphone.

She is both firm and comforting. “I don’t do funerals. Those funeral homes rip you off,” she tells a woman right before praying over her. “I’ll remember you. There’ll be no more tears or suffering.”

She is measured in her provisions. “I’ll give you bus tokens,” she says, “and if you get a job, I’ll give you a bus card.”

A woman in a ballcap asks for money to buy food at Target Field. “She’s never been to a Twins Game! She wants a snack,” Mary Jo later relays. She is certain of her choice to give a little money. “The world would say, ‘How is she going to use that money?’ But that’s what Jesus would do.”

A tall man with dark, somber eyes approaches her. “Last year, you helped me stop drinking,” he tells her.

“You’ll always stay sober if you trust in him,” she says, peering into his eyes, speaking of Christ. “I’m proud of you.”

Next is a petite woman with a red rosary around her neck and a bag of microwave popcorn under her arm. “I’m making a change in my life,” she says.

Her name is Bernadette. She’s a 55-year-old professional cleaner who was raised Catholic.

Mary Jo sizes her up and prays to God, “You’ve been waiting for her to come back for a long time, and now she’s coming back.”

Tears stream down Bernadette’s face. “I always loved Mary Jo,” she later says. “Sometimes she’s got tough love. Both times she prayed for me, I got sober. I don’t think she’s a saint — I know.”

Dubbed “Minnesota’s Mother Teresa” and honored with a Presidential Citizens Medal, Mary Jo’s celebrity has grown along with her impact. The Minnesota native, a graduate of the Academy of Holy Angels in Richfield, is founder and director of Sharing and Caring Hands, a large facility behind Target Field that provides clothing and food to 300 to 500 poor and marginalized people daily. Next door, she operates Mary’s Place, transitional apartments for 600 that are trimmed in cheerful blue paint and lined by white rose bushes.

The past few years have been turbulent. Her longtime husband, Dick, died two-and-a-half years ago. The COVID-19 pandemic upended the world. While other shelters closed, Sharing and Caring Hands remained open, serving triple the crowd.

Next month, Mary Jo turns 80, and as she grapples with the constraints of an aging body, she is undeterred, pouring even more time and prayer into her ministry.

“She has changed,” says longtime friend Father Joseph Johnson, pastor of Holy Family in St. Louis Park. “Her self-gift is more transparent. Her life is being poured out. She jokes about how she’s bent over now and moving slower, but she’s still showing up and still giving of herself despite how she feels physically. What we see is a more transparent witness of what someone who has given her life entirely to Christ looks like.”

As her milestone birthday nears, that gift is more pronounced. “It costs her more to continue her work,” Father Johnson said. “It’s a greater generosity of heart.”

She rises by 4 a.m. to pray and work. In her mission, she is unflinching and impatient, bothered by having to wait for an elevator.

“You have to stand there for a minute!” she says. “That’s insane.”

Until a few months ago, she had refused the elevator, only taking the stairs. But a bad knee and sore foot finally brought an end to that boycott.

“I struggle with being patient with things,” Mary Jo says. “This building wouldn’t be here if I had one ounce of patience in my fingernails. I have to have everything done in a second.”

Her impatience is tied to her clarity of purpose, says Father Cory Rohlfing, pastor of Divine Mercy in Faribault. He served on the Sharing and Caring Hands board for a decade and is Mary Jo’s spiritual director. “If she’s convinced this is God’s will, she moves. She’s decisive.”

Her unwavering focus on God simplifies the equation. “She got over people pleasing a long time ago,” Father Rohlfing said. “She’s not worried about what people think, she’s worried about is this God’s will.”

That’s not to say she’s stern. Mary Jo has a bubbling levity. She is young at heart, drawing children to her side. “When you don’t grow up,” Mary Jo says, grinning, “it’s a good feeling.”

She does not look 80. “I think God is preserving her,” says her daughter Barb Copeland. “He has a lot of work for her.”

Other than the bend in her neck, Mary Jo looks untouched by time. Her hair — more pepper than salt — holds its signature curl, and her face is unwrinkled. It catches the light.

“She’s holy,” Father Rohlfing says by way of explanation.

“But at the same time,” he adds, “she’s real. She’s got her flaws and she knows them. Sometimes at Sharing and Caring Hands, she’ll look someone in the eyes and say, ‘I love you, but you’re going to have to go right now.’”

12 kids, endless laundry

Mary Jo has made a few adjustments as she ages. She delegates more, and her bad knee has required her to end her ritual of washing people’s feet.

“If I don’t take care of myself, I can’t take care of others,” she says.

A simple pleasure: eating cookie dough and watching a mystery on TV. “I like mysteries because I can figure out who killed that person. I used to work with the FBI. I love all those shows — “Chicago Fire” — because they save people. And I love “9-1-1″ — ‘What’s your emergency?’”

A quiet hour of TV is well earned. Mary Jo raised 12 children — six daughters, six sons — before launching her ministry. The Copeland family lived in a two-bedroom expansion in north Minneapolis. The kids slept in bunk beds in the attic.

“It taught me a lot of organization,” Mary Jo says. “I folded all those clothes on the steps, I ironed all those loads of wash every day. God wanted me to learn how to keep moving no matter what.”

There was delight in the duty, with Dick as a loving partner. The couple danced every Saturday night — a tradition they continued for many decades, hitting up The Lookout in Maple Grove for the country bands.

In 1985 — once her nest was empty — she founded Sharing and Caring Hands, a humble storefront intended to be a safety net for those who couldn’t get help from the welfare system. Today, its scale has expanded but its approach is still modest. The center relies solely on donations from the community, not accepting federal or state aid. It is run almost entirely by volunteers who thrill at the chance to pray with Mary Jo and serve alongside her.

“She is not of this world,” says longtime volunteer Maureen McNeary, a member of St. Elizabeth Ann Seton in Hastings. “That’s the only way to explain how she can keep doing what she is doing, day in and day out. She’s taught me so many great lessons in surrendering and trusting God. Worry is useless energy, she says. ‘If God brought you to it, he’ll get you through it.’”

Like Father Rohlfing, McNeary senses holiness in Mary Jo’s radiant face. “She radiates a peace that surpasses all understanding. Her trust in God is so strong that it actually shows in her face. There is a calmness and serenity there in the midst of chaos. When you make real eye contact with her, it’s as if you can feel her loving soul envelop you.”

Eyes on the cross

Prayer was a lifeline in her difficult childhood. “I’ve been doing the Stations of the Cross since I was a little girl,” she says. “I had a 10-cent booklet. That’s what softened my heart, to know God did such great suffering. I got sick a lot, and I thought about how much the Lord has endured — and his mother Mary. She never questioned it.”

Her early years filled her with a compassion that now is a bridge for the poor and marginalized in her midst. “I can relate to them and they can relate to me. They’ve taught me to go on no matter what happens. Many of them don’t have religion when they come here. But they learn how to pray when they come here, in their own way.”

The bonds Mary Jo forges at Sharing and Caring Hands are striking, Father Rolhfing said. “She has the ability to see Jesus in the poor. She just can. She has the charism of mercy. That’s a gift that allows her to see people’s needs.”

Sitting before that long line responding to request after request would be “super taxing” for most people, he said — but not Mary Jo. “She has the ability to know who is in need, what kind of need, is it genuine — when a person just needs a prayer or for someone to be kind to them or when they need just plain financial help,” he said.

Losing Dick meant no longer having her sounding board. “She’s had to do a little more now,” Barb said. “She’s done fantastic with that, and that’s due to her prayer life. She always tells the seminarians and priests that she focuses on that cross. That gives her that strength.”

Two and a half years after his death, she is still grieving. She’s lost 35 pounds since his death.

“It’s been so hard,” she says. “I sure miss him. But I gave it to Jesus. I know Dick is praying for me. I know he’s here.”

Widowhood has given Mary Jo even more hours to pour into prayer. She often devotes three hours to prayer, beginning her first rosary each morning in the shower. It combats her worries about the state of the world. And with each passing year, it feels more and more like her mission.

“I want to bring prayer to the world,” Mary Jo says. “That’s my dream. The power and peace of prayer changes our lives. There wouldn’t be the turmoil in our world if our leaders would remember the power of prayer.”

She does it one by one, making her way through the long breakfast line with the offer of a rosary and a prayer. Not one is declined.

“She gives hope,” Barb says. “We need that more than ever, especially in these times. She has a simple faith. Nothing fazes her. When someone comes with all their life problems, she goes, ‘Well, you made it here! Everything is going to be fine.’ She was handpicked by God, and she’s got that trust.”

It powers her, morning after morning.

“This is the hardest time I’ve ever experienced here, in all my years,” Mary Jo says. “People can’t find proper housing. Landlords are just putting them on the street. The price of food. Gun violence. The dysfunction, the sadness. I promised God he could count on me to finish his work. I live each day knowing that I’m serving him. He’ll bring me when the time is right. He keeps telling me there’s a lot more work for me to do.”