Hoa Thi suffers from a horribly swollen lower leg that resembles elephantiasis but has never been successfully diagnosed. The 34-year-old woman has had this ailment since birth, yet remains remarkably cheerful. Now, thanks to a project supported by Maryknoll at Hai Hau in northern Vietnam, she and many other people with physical disabilities are learning skills that can help them support themselves. Hoa embroiders beads into beautiful patterns on garments that find a ready market in Hanoi.

The skills training center that Maryknoll supports at Hai Hau in Nam Dinh province, southeast of the nation's capital, Hanoi, is typical of the work the Maryknoll Fathers do in Vietnam. Besides being a bridge to the local Catholic Church, Maryknoll's mission in this Southeast Asian nation is serving the neediest people, like Hoa, whom life has short-changed on options.

"We've seen a great personal development in the trainees, because of the confidence that they have in learning the skill and being able to support themselves and their families," says Father Thomas O'Brien, the lone Maryknoller in Vietnam these days.

From Maryknoll's start in Vietnam in 1993, after the Vatican asked the mission society to provide humanitarian help to the country, Maryknoll has operated as a charity, or non-governmental organization (NGO), working with other foreign charities and funding agencies that support local NGOs and government bodies. Vietnam does not allow foreign priests to work in a clerical capacity.

"All the NGO projects here have to have a local partner," says Father O'Brien. "All the socio-economic types of projects we do will eventually be run by those entities. There is no problem worrying whether the project will continue after Maryknoll leaves."

In almost two decades in Vietnam, Maryknoll has helped thousands of poor Vietnamese, especially children, youths, women and those with physical and mental disabilities.

Father O'Brien, 66, from the Bronx, N.Y., originally served in mission in the Philippines, where he was pastor of a parish. In the first half of the 1990s he shifted gears to work in Washington, D.C., with Maryknoll's Peace and Justice Office and the Office for Global Concerns.

Coming to Vietnam in 1995, Father O'Brien has helped build Maryknoll's legacy of compassion there. "We have always been respected for the kinds of projects we run and how effectively we work with local organizations," he says. "The government knows we are religious but doesn't mind as long as we do our job well."

"In terms of being a missioner, we're giving a witness to a fairly secular society with a communist political system," Father O'Brien says. "We can witness to God's love in many ways here, especially by doing projects that help the poorest of the poor."

The missioner notes that while Vietnam is about 7 percent Catholic, in some of the areas where he works, particularly Nam Dinh province, Catholics make up 30 percent of the population. The churches are open and flourishing, with many people attracted to religious vocations. He says the local Church in the north has a "traditional kind of piety" because it was isolated from the rest of the Church for decades.

Like other Americans who come to Vietnam, Father O'Brien at first expected a negative reaction because of U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War, which ended in 1975.

"This has not been our experience," he says. "Admittedly, most of the population is too young to remember the war, but even among the old, there is no obvious resentment."

Today, despite the country's tumultuous past, Vietnam is a safe and cohesive country, he says. "It's the most peaceful place in Asia. It's the most peaceful place I've ever lived in," he says. The Vietnamese naturally work well together and get things done, he says, making the country a model for international aid organizations. "They use the aid they get effectively. You can see the results."

Using a capitalist economy with a communist-ruled government, Vietnam has become one of the Pacific Rim's economic Tigers. However, poverty is widespread in this densely populated nation, especially in the rural areas, which is where most Maryknoll projects are based.

Helping children and adults with disabilities is a big part of Maryknoll's work there.

The Bui Chu orphanage, which Maryknoll helps fund, lies in the countryside surrounded by rice fields. It was started in 1850 by French missionaries and is still running, staffed by about 30 Catholic Sisters working in an atmosphere of love and devotion. There, Bui Thi Thu, an 11-year-old, has lived all her life, after being abandoned at the orphanage door when she was a baby. Her sparkling, intelligent face belies her severe physical disability. Her withered arms and legs are useless and she has to be carried everywhere and fed. The orphanage cares for both disabled and non-disabled children.

The Thuan Thanh Disabled Children's Center, east of Hanoi, treats children with paralysis, hearing and speech impairments, mental retardation, learning disabilities and limb deformities, using a combination of Western and Eastern medicine. Maryknoll has helped by financing rehabilitation equipment, renovations, staff training and providing food. Father O'Brien says Maryknoll supports several similar centers.

Maryknoll also helps the blind in Vietnam and since 2005 has been working with a chapter of the National Blind Association in Hai Duong, a city southeast of Hanoi. The program helps train the visually impaired to become massage therapists and provides a center for them to carry out their work.

Last year Maryknoll started a music project for the blind, providing training for musicians on traditional and modern instruments and vocals so they can work in Hanoi's lively music industry, says Father O'Brien.

Another project getting Maryknoll support is Morning Star, an NGO that treats severe autism, a condition that was barely recognized in Vietnam as recently as 15 years ago, the missioner says.

A staff of eight people works with Father O'Brien, multiplying his efforts. The staff includes three project officers and two administrators who double as project coordinators.

Miss Vu Cam Ha, one of the project officers, says Father O'Brien and his projects "are very famous in Hanoi." She says, "Many people like him, even the people he doesn't directly help, thanks to his good reputation and his friendly way of communicating.  Father Tom stays in touch with people he helped years ago when they were kids. For him it's for the long term!"

Watch a video related to the article on Maryknoll's website click here or watch on Youtube click here

Sean Sprague, a photojournalist and writer based in Wales, is a regular contributor to Maryknoll magazine.

For more information about the Maryknoll Fathers and Brothers visit www.maryknollsociety.org