ELLIS BROWN: He said, "What are you doing down here? What are you doing?" I said, "Father, my wife died and I just gave up living." He said, "Get in the back of the car." First he said, "Go down in the basement and tell Dick and Peter to give you a shower," he said, "because you smell terrible."

Mr. PHILLIPS: I really didn't want to live anymore. Society had hit me with a blow. I had lost everything I had -- my family.

Mr. BROWN: I just sat there wondering, "Why is he interested in me? Why does he care what happens to me? Nobody else cares."

VALENTE: As a young priest working with troubled children, then as a parish priest, and finally at Catholic Charities, McDermott had seen what alcohol could do.

Fr. MAC: I saw alcoholism not as an individual sickness. I saw it as a family sickness because of the children who had a father who majored in overimbibing.

VALENTE: The Haymarket Center, which gets most of its funding from state and local governments, does not evangelize. But spirituality is at the core of its programs.

Unidentified Woman #1 (At Counseling Session): Weakness is not a sin.

VALENTE: The often dangerous world of Skid Row was a world of men. Now, more than half the clients at Haymarket are women -- and many of them, like these women, are pregnant.

Unidentified Woman #2: Every day it was the same old thing -- drugging, drinking, smoking. All day, every day. But today, I feel a little lighter. I'm learning, I'm learning, you know, and I got a little peace of mind.

Fr. MAC: People whom we are privileged to serve see somebody else making it. "If he can make it, I can make it."

VALENTE: McDermott's 94th birthday party was held at the day care facility. To date, 900 healthy babies have been born to women who had come to Haymarket -- 900 babies who might have been born drug-affected. Other services include education, job training, and placement. McDermott is a constant presence, seven days a week.

Mr. SOUCEK: Father is a throwback to the old priest: the priest that goes to the gravesite, the priest that visits the person in the hospital, the priest that goes to wakes, the priest that still remembers everybody that he's baptized and married and is there giving them their last rites.

VALENTE: Anton Kowalcik was a derelict and a loner, in and out of Haymarket Center for 15 years. When he died he was sober, but any family he had is long gone. Father Mac will say his funeral mass on this day. In his study, the priest reflects.

Fr. MAC: We picked him up, I think, at Madison and Halsted streets. He looked like he hadn't eaten since the Council of Trent. Haymarket was his family. I often think of that, how many people are shortchanged in life and wind up without a sole person interested in them.

VALENTE: McDermott believes that people like Anton Kowalcik deserve dignity at the end of their lives.

Fr. MAC (During Homily): Skid Row is a state of mind. It's not a piece of real estate. Even though you were shortchanged in this life, Anton, you hit the jackpot. You're sitting front row in the Heavenly Kingdom.

Mr. BROWN: When Father Mac leaves us and he goes to heaven, there's no more Father Mac. There's no one [left] who can take Father Mac's place. I feel sorry. I feel sorry.

VALENTE: As for McDermott himself, he says God dealt him aces -- a good family and a long healthy life.

Fr. MAC: I have so many things to thank the Lord for having brought me into the world. I'm approaching the C-mark, the century mark. What more could I ask for?

VALENTE: For RELIGION & ETHICS NEWSWEEKLY, this is Judy Valente in Chicago.