 
Redemptorist Given SLU's Top Honor
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"Father Maier has exemplified the Ignatian ideals and spirit of service in his tireless dedication to others," said University President Lawrence Biondi, SJ. "It is an honor to present him with the Sword of Ignatius Loyola."
For nearly 30 years, Maier has lived with, worked for and ministered to the residents of the Klong Toey slum in Bangkok, Thailand. As president and founder of the Human Development Foundation, he has spent more than half of his life helping the Thai people help themselves.
Maier moved to Thailand in 1967 as a missionary priest in the Redemptorist order. He studied the Thai language in Bangkok for a year and then served as a parish priest in a rural Catholic village and in northern Laos.
In 1971 he returned to Bangkok to begin his life's work, establishing the Human Development Foundation (HDF).
The HDF, located in the Klong Toey slum, employs more than 200 people and works with many volunteers to teach the residents responsibility. The HDF runs the Slum Kindergarten Program, which consists of 32 schools that provide a kindergarten education, food, uniforms and books to approximately 4,000 children, and the Sponsor-A-Child Program, which matches sponsors to children who need financial aid for education.
The foundation oversees many other programs, including a shelter for street children, an AIDS clinic and hospice, a sewing enterprise, youth sports, vocational training and a home for children and mothers with AIDS.
Maier is a founding member of the Asian Coalition for Housing Rights and has served as the Southeast Asian representative to the board of Habitat International Coalition for Housing Rights. A native of Longview, Wash., he received his undergraduate education at Immaculate Conception Major Seminary in Wisconsin and earned a master's degree from the Asian Institute of Technology.
The Sword of Ignatius Loyola is named for the founder of the Society of Jesus, Inigo Lopez de Loyola. A soldier-knight who resolved to devote his life to God and the Church, Loyola expressed his devotion when he laid his sword and dagger on the altar at the Shrine of Our Lady at the Abbey of Montserrat near Manresa and offered his life to the service of Our Lady as a knight of God.
The sword is symbolic of the Ignatian vision of service and is awarded to those who have given of themselves to humankind for the greater glory of God.
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