Jim Cavnar and a small group of colleagues launched Cross Catholic Outreach to support parishes and ministries that directly serve the world’s poor in their own communities. Jim’s career spans more than four decades in ministry management and leadership. Since its conception two decades ago, Cross Catholic Outreach has grown from a fledgling enterprise to a Vatican-endorsed charity working in dozens of countries.

Michele Sagarino leads our daily operations with a heart for service. Michele Joined Cross Catholic Outreach in 2004 and served as vice president for development for 15 years before being named president. Michele brings deep compassion for the poor and nearly three decades in nonprofit leadership experience to her role as she leads forward with wisdom and integrity, allowing us and our donors to impact even more lives.

Raised in the Catholic Church, Michael Veitenhans felt called from a young age to serve the poor and vulnerable. He came to Cross Catholic Outreach in 2019, bringing 25 years of experience with World Vision, where he held executive positions in both the U.S. and Zambia and played a key role in developing the ministry’s Gifts-in-Kind program. Today, Michael oversees our International Programs Group which includes disaster relief response, grants, material aid, institutional grants acquisition, global program partnerships, program monitoring, evaluation, accountability, learning and impact measurement, reporting and compliance.