Catholic Social Services of Southern Nebraska : Who We Are : Mission & History

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Our mission as Catholic Social Services of Southern Nebraska is to perform the Works of Mercy in response to the call of God.

We trace our beginnings to 1932 when Bishop Louis Kucera founded CSS to respond to the needs of persons suffering the effects of the Great Depression.

We are an agency of the Catholic Diocese of Lincoln serving under the auspices of Bishop James Conley.

God has called us to build up the Body of Christ in southern Nebraska through the spiritual and corporal works of mercy. We are called to grow in holiness, walk in trust, serve with integrity, and faithfully proclaim the Gospel.

Working together, our goal is to bring Hope in the Good Life to those we serve together.

Our Rebranding Story

We wanted to show that we serve the entire southern third of Nebraska—both urban and rural parts—and we wanted people to know that we are Catholic and that the Eucharist binds us together and unifies us in our diocese. Hence, all of this is reflected in our logo. The blue represents the Platte River, which everything south of the Platte is where we serve—the Diocese of Lincoln. The green represents agriculture, the backbone of our diocese and state. The paved roads represent urban centers. And the cross and circle represent that we are united in the Eucharist in our Catholic faith.

Our new slogan also has a double intent: “Hope in the Good Life.” Through our work at CSS we bring hope to the people we serve. But we know everything we do materially is derivative of a spiritual reality: that true hope lies in the Life of the true Good—God. Hence, our hope comes from and brings people to God. And we are humbled to be His instruments in our work.

CSS aims to be a unitive force in our diocese. We do the good work of Christ and His Church. We seek to partner with all people of our diocese and we want all of us to be proud to be Catholic. At CSS we do not just serve Catholics—we serve everyone that we can because we are Catholic.

-CSS Executive Director Fr. Justin Fulton

Square miles served in the Diocese of Lincoln last year

24,000
Cash & in-kind assistance provided across southern Nebraska last year

$1,800,000
Counseling sessions through the Immaculate Heart of Mary Counseling Center last year

5,268
Nights of lodging & safety provided through St. Gianna’s Women’s Homes last year

17,280

© 2020 Catholic Social Services of Southern Nebraska

Privacy Policy

What Information Do We Collect? When you visit our website you may provide us with two types of information: personal information you knowingly choose to disclose that is collected on an individual basis and website use information collected on an aggregate basis as you and others browse our website.
Personal Information You Choose to Provide We may request that you voluntarily supply us with personal information, including your email address, postal address, home or work telephone number and other personal information for such purposes as correspondence, placing an order, requesting an estimate, or participating in online surveys. If you choose to correspond with us through email, we may retain the content of your email messages together with your email address and our responses. We provide the same protections for these electronic communications that we employ in the maintenance of information received by mail and telephone.
Website Use Information Similar to other websites, our site may utilize a standard technology called "cookies" (see explanation below, "What Are Cookies?") and web server logs to collect information about how our website is used. Information gathered through cookies and server logs may include the date and time of visits, the pages viewed, time spent at our website, and the sites visited just before and just after ours. This information is collected on an aggregate basis. None of this information is associated with you as an individual.
How Do We Use the Information That You Provide to Us? Broadly speaking, we use personal information for purposes of administering our business activities, providing service and support and making available other products and services to our customers and prospective customers. Occasionally, we may also use the information we collect to notify you about important changes to our website, new services and special offers we think you will find valuable. The lists used to send you product and service offers are developed and managed under our traditional standards designed to safeguard the security and privacy of all personal information provided by our users. You may at any time to notify us of your desire not to receive these offers.
What Are Cookies? Cookies are a feature of web browser software that allows web servers to recognize the computer used to access a website. Cookies are small pieces of data that are stored by a user's web browser on the user's hard drive. Cookies can remember what information a user accesses on one web page to simplify subsequent interactions with that website by the same user or to use the information to streamline the user's transactions on related web pages. This makes it easier for a user to move from web page to web page and to complete commercial transactions over the Internet. Cookies should make your online experience easier and more personalized.
How Do We Use Information Collected From Cookies? We use website browser software tools such as cookies and web server logs to gather information about our website users' browsing activities, in order to constantly improve our website and better serve our users. This information assists us to design and arrange our web pages in the most user-friendly manner and to continually improve our website to better meet the needs of our users and prospective users. Cookies help us collect important business and technical statistics. The information in the cookies lets us trace the paths followed by users to our website as they move from one page to another. Web server logs allow us to count how many people visit our website and evaluate our website's visitor capacity. We do not use these technologies to capture your individual email address or any personally identifying information about you.
Notice of New Services and Changes Occasionally, we may use the information we collect to notify you about important changes to our website, new services and special offers we think you will find valuable. As a user of our website, you will be given the opportunity to notify us of your desire not to receive these offers by clicking on a response box when you receive such an offer or by sending us an email request.
How Do We Secure Information Transmissions? When you send confidential personal information to us on our website, a secure server software which we have licensed encrypts all information you input before it is sent to us. The information is scrambled en route and decoded once it reaches our website. Other email that you may send to us may not be secure unless we advise you that security measures will be in place prior to your transmitting the information. For that reason, we ask that you do not send confidential information such as Social Security, credit card, or account numbers to us through an unsecured email.
How Do We Protect Your Information? Information Security -- We utilize encryption/security software to safeguard the confidentiality of personal information we collect from unauthorized access or disclosure and accidental loss, alteration or destruction. Evaluation of Information Protection Practices -- Periodically, our operations and business practices are reviewed for compliance with organization policies and procedures governing the security, confidentiality and quality of our information. Employee Access, Training and Expectations -- Our organization values, ethical standards, policies and practices are committed to the protection of user information. In general, our business practices limit employee access to confidential information, and limit the use and disclosure of such information to authorized persons, processes and transactions.
How Can You Access and Correct Your Information? You may request access to all your personally identifiable information that we collect online and maintain in our database by emailing us using the contact form provided to you within the site structure of our website.
Do We Disclose Information to Outside Parties? We may provide aggregate information about our customers, sales, website traffic patterns and related website information to our affiliates or reputable third parties, but this information will not include personally identifying data, except as otherwise provided in this privacy policy.
What About Legally Compelled Disclosure of Information? We may disclose information when legally compelled to do so, in other words, when we, in good faith, believe that the law requires it or for the protection of our legal rights.
Permission to Use of Materials The right to download and store or output the materials in our website is granted for the user's personal use only, and materials may not be reproduced in any edited form. Any other reproduction, transmission, performance, display or editing of these materials by any means mechanical or electronic without our express written permission is strictly prohibited. Users wishing to obtain permission to reprint or reproduce any materials appearing on this site may contact us directly.

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