C6 wuerl from C1 The service was part worship,


part ogling and part “media- blitz,” said Jennifer Kiessling, 36, of Silver Spring. Kiessling, a government law-


yer,was atMasswithherhusband and two young children. Although they are connected


with a local parish, Kiessling said they come to the basilica on Christmas because “it’s one of the most beautiful environments I’ve ever seen — the architecture, the high-profile religious figures,” the very global crowd. Worshipers tendtoincludemanyimmigrants, and outfits ranged fromhigh, stiff African hats onwomen to Peruvi- an wool jackets on men. There were elderly women with blond bouffants and youngmen in buzz cuts. “There’s nothing like this in


California,” Kiessling said. “We canmake everyone jealous.” In the crowd were Washingto-


nians notable for various reasons, including conservative leader — andCatholic convert—NewtGin- grich and Diego D’Ambrosio, a Dupont Circle barber known for such well-heeled clients asWuerl and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.). The basilica’s seats were full


and dozens were standing by the timeWuerlgavehishomily,which focused on Christmas as a time of recommitting to one’s faith—and to sharing it. Wuerl, an elegant if formal


Gone but not forgotten MELINA MARA/THE WASHINGTON POST


At the basilica dinner, Ramon Flores of Fairfax County prays and cries, feeling overwhelmed by family losses from illness and civil strife in his and his wife’s homelands ofHonduras andHungary. Flores’s wife,Ava (back to camera), is especially mourning the recent death of her mother, aHolocaust survivor.


priest, is known as a serious teacher,not one to use ahomily— evenwith an audience of 4,000— to reference events in the news. He spoke about theword “Christ- mas” — Christ’s Mass — and the importance of evangelizing and sharing the teachings of Jesus.


“The new evangelization can


be as simple as ‘Merry Christmas’ to someone who needs to hear thesewords ofhope, joy andlove,” Wuerl said from the altar high above the silent crowd. Meanwhile, in the basilica’s basement, people shopped at the


gift store, watched the service on a live feed and ate at a special meal for those alone or in need. After the Mass, Wuerl joined a volunteer choir in the cafeteria to sing “Silent Night” and “Happy Birthday.”


boorsteinm@washpost.com


Rising need is creating a wider gulf in Fairfax


fairfax from C1


homeless shelters have jobs. And although the overall number has dipped, partly because of federal stimulus money and an aggres- sive programto help families stay in their homes, there is still a waiting list of more than 100 families needing shelter. Recent census data suggest


TRACY A. WOODWARD/THE WASHINGTON POST


Joyce Davis of Alexandria places a Christmas tree at the grave of her husband,Russell E. Davis, Saturday at ArlingtonNational Cemetery.


Storm expected to hit region snow from C1


snowcrewswere standing by. “We’re just watching the fore-


cast like everyone else,” said Courtney Mickalonis, a spokes- woman for the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority, which oversees Dulles Interna- tional and Reagan National air- ports. “We won’t know until the snow starts what we’re dealing with.” JonathanO.Dean,aspokesman


for the Baltimore-Washington In- ternationalMarshallAirport, said that there might have been a few delays for BWI-related flights be- causeof snowyweather elsewhere but that operationswerenormal. VirginiaGov.Robert F.McDon-


nell (R) declared a state of emer- gency Saturday as a precaution. The declaration allowed state agencies tobeginteamingupwith local governments to prepare for the storm. A statement from Mc- Donnell’s office saidthat although “there is still uncertaintywith the storm’s track,” the outlook includ- ed the possibility of 12 inches of snow and high winds for eastern Virginia, including the Eastern Shore, and snowfall of two to sev- en inches along the Interstate 95 corridor and two to five inches along Interstate 81. The intermittent flurries Satur-


day morning provoked questions about what qualifies as a “white Christmas.” The flurries were duly noted in


weather records.They prompted a “T” for “trace” to be entered in the snowfall columnfor Saturday.But formany, the experience fell short of the scene that inspired song- writer Irving Berlin and crooner BingCrosby. “Idon’t knowwhether it counts


asawhiteChristmas,”Junker said. “Itwasn’tatmyhouse.Theground wasn’twhite.” A postcard-perfect white


Christmas is a rarity around the D.C. area. The last Christmas Day snowfall in Washington, in 2002, startedout inthemorning as rain. Total accumulation that day: two- tenths of aninch. A measurable amount of snow


has fallen on Christmas Day only nine times since 1888. The biggest Christmas Day snowfall was 5.4 inches in1962. Saturday afternoon, as rem-


nants of the flurries blew by, a few residents were still holding out hope for ameteorologicalmiracle. “The skies look like they’re try-


ing to make snow, don’t they, guys?” said Seyoung Kappel of Al- exandria, who was ice skating in Pentagon City with her daughter Catherine, 7, and her son Chris- tian, 5, while husband Jeff manneda video camera. “I thinkitwouldbe reallynice if


it snowed,” said SeemaGajwani of Capitol Hill, who said her two children, ages 2 and 4, were so eager for a repeat of last winter’s “Snowmageddon” that a few weeks ago, when the region got a light dusting, they went in the back yard and scraped together what snow they could so they couldjumpinit. On the other end of the rink, a


little girl in a purple coat locked her eyes on a snowflake as it drift- ed toward her, then stuck her tongue out to try to catchit. A few inches ofwhite no longer


impresses Amos Gelb, 46, a self- described “recovering journalist” who teaches at George Washing- ton University and has a prefer- ence for newsworthy weather events. “Five inches? What pathetic


weather,” he said. “Bring back Snowpocalypse.” shina@washpost.com


boorsteinm@washpost.com


StaffwriterMartinWeil contributed to this report.


that the differences between the two Fairfaxes has only grown during the past decade: In 1999, the richest one-fifth of county residents earned about nine times more than the poorest one- fifth. By 2006, the spread was almost 11 times more. Stephanie Berkowitz, a vice president at Northern Virginia Family Service, a nonprofit group based in Falls Church, said there are signs of another shift as well. Early on, the recession hit new arrivals hardest. Butnowthey are serving more people who have spent their lives in Fairfax Coun- ty. In the nonprofit’s “Training Futures,” for example, at least half the people attending the job- training program are native Vir- ginians, compared with about 20 to 30 percent before the reces- sion, she said. “Now we’re seeing deeper,


more entrenched need,” she said. It’s been well documented


since the recession began in De- cember 2007 that poverty levels have risen and homes and jobs have been lost. But what amazes many case workers is the level of need that remains in one of the wealthiest parts of the country 18 monthsafter the recession ended, in June 2009. The need remains steady, even as the amount of donations to some groups has slackened. “It’s a long journey for a lot of


people. And the journey’s becom- ing longer,” said Kerrie Wilson, executive director of Reston In- terfaith. Before the recession, the rule of thumb was that clients generally need a month’s help; now it’s three months and count- ing. Just as some were exulting in


the success reflected in the new census data, others were dealing with more sobering realities. De- mandfor food stampshas risen 57 percent from July 2008 to June 2010, while the overall caseload for the county’s Family Services has gone up 37 percent in the same period. Sharon Frost, also a vice presi-


dent at Northern Virginia Family Service, said the number of peo- ple calling for emergency dental services — usually because they can no longer stand the pain but lack health insurance to pay for a procedure—has jumped to more than 7,000 this year, compared with about 4,100 the previous year. The number of homeless children attending county schools increased by nearly a third, to 1,574, as of this month, compared with 1,190 last Decem- ber,Fairfax County public schools spokesman Paul Regnier said. Others might not be homeless but are living doubled up with rela- tives, officials said. “Our poverty level is the high-


estwe’ve seen in a long time,” said school board member Jane K.


Strauss (Dranesville). “We also know it’s an undercount.” The number of students who received free or reduced-price meals in the schools — another indicator of need—rose by about 1,000, to 25.4 percent of students, from 24.8, she said. In the 2007 school year, it was 20 percent. “Demand is increasing every


year — demand for food, assis- tance for rent, for utilities,” said Melissa Jansen, executive direc- tor of Western Fairfax Christian Ministries, the charity that runs a thrift store and food pantry in a Chantilly shopping plaza. “More middle-class folks are


now shopping at our [thrift] store,” Jansen said. “Now what that says to me is that they’re trying to cut costs.” Five days before Christmas,


ElizabethHawkins was doing her best to cut costs while also giving to others as she blitzed through the thrift store buying last-min- ute gifts and stocking stuffers. While her two young children


played nearby, Hawkins picked out a set of yuletide tableware trimmedingoldandholly (for her sister), an armful of knickknacks (for the kids)andamoundofused books that filled two laundry bas- kets (for anyone and everyone). The total cost of her haul:


$31.36. Hawkins, who was born and


raised in Fairfax and who, up until recently, sold real estate, is one of many who still seem sur- prised that her family’s fortunes could turn for the worse so quick- ly. She now gives voice lessons to help pay the bills. Hawkins, 40, said the recession


has imposed on her and her fami- ly an unfamiliar and unbending economy. Her husband, Chris, andtheir twochildrenwereliving well: an $800,000 house, which was purchased at the height of the market with interest-only loans. “Then the market crashed, and


I went from very lovely sales to basically nothing,”Hawkins said. Now she knows all the tricks to economizing. “We buy secondhand clothes,


shoes. We go to the library a lot. We definitely use all the coupons that come in the mail — McDon- ald’s, whatever,”Hawkins said. Her family outings often con-


sist of free events that are spon- sored by the county or trips to its parks and libraries. “Up until we were wearing hats and mittens, we went to Great Falls every weekend,” she said. “It’s hard when you know people who are giving their child these big, lovely presents.” The week before, she picked up


a pair of black suede pumps so she would look her best singing in a church concert. A year earlier, she found an artificial Christmas tree. She put it together on the sidewalk to make sure all the pieces were there before taking it home. Just the same, she considers


herself upper middle class. “Even with that, we are struggling to stay above water,” she said. “It doesn’t make sense.” kunklef@washpost.com


EZ SU


KLMNO A moving Mass for so many reasons


SUNDAY, DECEMBER 26, 2010 OBITUARIES


FAMILY PHOTO


John H. Cross, a professor at theUniformed ServicesUniversity of theHealth Sciences, served in theNavy duringWorldWar II.


ALOCALLIFE:JOHNCROSS, 85


Solved mysterious parasitic illness in the Philippines


BY EMMA BROWN People began dying by the doz-


ens in little coastal villages in the Philippines in the 1960s, and no one knew why. Some suspected a curseandhired twowitchdoctors to exorcise the area. The two toiled until one of them died of the very illness they were trying to drive out. John Cross, a civilian parasitol-


ogist leading the U.S. Navy’s ef- forts to prevent outbreaks of trop- ical diseases by understanding parasites’ ecology and biology, sent two scientists to find out what was going on. They quickly discovered that


the villagers were suffering from acute infections of a worm that caused extraordinary diarrhea, emaciation and death. But it was years before anyone could say with certainty how the villagers had been infected and how the spread of disease could be stopped. Dr. Cross, the sleuth who even-


tually solved that mystery with a combination of creative experi- mentation and stubborn endur- ance, died Nov. 19 of complica- tions from diabetes at Shady Grove Adventist Hospital


in


Rockville.He was 85. He had taught since 1984 at the


Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda, where hewasadmired by medical students for his engaging lectures highlighted by photographs and stories from more than two de- cades of studying tropical diseas- es in Asia. The litany of diseases he stud-


ied included schistosomiasis, ma- laria and the plague. He was perhaps best known for his work on the mysterious, cholera-like illness that attacked Filipino vil- lagers on the island of Luzon in the 1960s and has since appeared in Thailand, Iran and Egypt. At the time of the outbreak, the


worm that caused the illness was new to science and its life cycle was not understood. Capillaria philippinensiswasfirst identified in 1964. Navy scientists suspected that


villagers, whose diet consisted of rawfish and shrimp, were ingest- ing the Capillaria worms with their food. But the scientists, working in a makeshift hospital and laboratory powered by a Honda generator, could not find evidence to show what other ani- malsharbored thewormorhowit was being delivered to villagers’ intestines. “We went through 30,000


necropsies, everything from shrimp and little fish to cattle and sheep, and we never could find anything,” said K. Darwin Mur- rell, who was a young Navy para- sitologist working under Dr. Cross at the time. “We were really puzzled.” After more than a year of that


tedious work, Murrell was trans- ferred back to the United States. He doubted that anyone would ever untangle the Capillaria out- break, and he began to believe it wasa freak occurrence that posed no enduring threat. “I remember telling John I


thought it was senseless to try to continue to do necropsies on ev- erything under the sun down there, that this was an ephemeral event and we probably wouldn’t see it again,”Murrell said. “I could see he was skeptical of that.” Dr. Cross took his efforts into a


laboratory, where he began a painstaking process of trying to infect various animals with the Capillaria eggs. He even swallowed the eggs


himself. When he did not become infected, he had good evidence that humans could not be sick- ened by exposure. He surmised that the worms could reproduce in a human only if that person had ingested larvae.


“I felt like I’d given up too early on this thing. It was a personal lesson to me. Don’t quit.”


—K. Darwin Murrell, after learning of Dr. Cross’s Capillaria discovery


Those larvae, Dr. Cross discov-


ered in the lab, were able to hatch in the guts of little freshwater and brackish-water fish that lived in lagoons along the coast of the Philippines. Rather than continuing to ex- perimentonhimself, he tested his theory by exposing other mam- mals: monkeys, gerbils and rats. The mammals became ill, and their symptoms mimicked those of humans sick with Capillaria, suggesting that Dr. Cross had succeeded in recreating the worm’s path from village lagoons to villagers’ intestines. People were becoming ill, he concluded, after eating raw fish that were infected with Capillaria larvae. Infection could be easily prevented by cooking food and could be effectively treated with the right drug. Dr. Cross went on to show that


fish-eating birds also could be- come infected with larvae, and surmised that such birds were the natural host for the Capillaria worm. After learning that Dr. Cross


had figured out the Capillaria puzzle, Murrell was “a little em- barrassed,” he said. “I felt like I’d given up too early


on this thing. It was a personal lesson to me,” he said. “Don’t quit.” John Henry Cross was born


Sept. 25, 1925, in Lynn, Mass. He served in theNavy in theSolomon Islands during World War II. In 1945, as the war drew to a close, he joined the nascent United Na- tions Relief and Rehabilitation Administration in Shanghai, where he met his wife, Evelyn Chang. They married in 1952, after returning to the United States for school. Besides his wife, survivors in-


clude a daughter, Kelley Cross Finn of Rockville, and a grand- son. A son, John F. Cross, died in 1979. Dr. Cross graduated in 1953


fromMiamiUniversity in Oxford, Ohio, and received a master’s degree there in 1955 in parasitolo- gy.


After receiving a doctorate in


parasitology in 1958 from the University of Texas at Galveston, Dr. Cross taught at theUniversity of Arkansas medical school until 1967, when he was asked to head up the new medical ecology de- partment in the well-regarded U.S.NavalMedical ResearchUnit No. 2. He worked for theNavy for the


next two decades. Based in Taipei and Manila, he traveled widely, mentored many young scientists and was known in Southeast Asia as “Papa John.” His long history of working on


that continent was honored in 2007 with an honorary doctorate fromMahidolUniversity in Bang- kok. His daughter recalled watch-


ing slide shows he gave after returning from research trips. “It was never, ‘Look at this beautiful countryside,’ ” she said. Instead, his photographs featured villag- ers, often infected with a parasitic disease. Unmoved by her father’s pas-


sion, she did not become a parasi- tologist herself. “I became more of a hypochondriac,” she said. browne@washpost.com


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