-She guides 16 programs and hundreds of employees in a mission to give help and hope to people in need.

Catholic Charities of Southern Nevada President and CEO Sara Ramirez is our guest this week on Nevada Week In Person.

♪♪ -Support for Nevada Week In Person is provided by Senator William H. Hernstadt and other supporters.

-Welcome to Nevada Week In Person.

I'm Amber Renee Dixon.

She didn't grow up Catholic, and she didn't plan on a career in social work.

But more than two decades later, she's built her life's work around service, including leadership roles at Catholic Charities in Fort Worth and Central Texas.

Now she leads one of the largest nonprofit social service organizations in the state, overseeing programs that provide food, shelter, and family support.

Sara Ramirez, President and CEO of Catholic Charities of Southern Nevada, thank you for joining Nevada Week In person.

-Well, thank you for having me.

-You have been here a little more than a year now?

-Almost a year and a half.

-Okay.

And you come from Texas, which is-- Did you spend most of your life there?

Where were you born?

Where were you raised?

-Sure.

Well, I love to tell everyone I am a Georgia peach.

So I was born in Savannah, Georgia.

My entire family is military.

And so then we relocated to the Texas Panhandle when I was about three, and I have spent my entire life, minus when we moved here to Las Vegas, in Texas.

-Which I was telling you off camera I lived in Texas for a bit, and I could tell the pride people have in living there.

So how big of a deal was that move?

-You know, it was a big deal.

My husband and I are the ones that relocated.

We didn't know anyone in this community, so it was a blind faith, if you will.

But, Amber, I'll tell you, when we got here, there is something so beautiful about Las Vegas.

So when I first got this opportunity, Archbishop Thomas had said to me, Sara, you may know Vegas.

We look forward to introducing you to Las Vegas.

I had no idea what he was talking about at the time.

And after a year after being here, I was like, I get it.

Las Vegas has the energy of the big city but the heart of a small town, where neighbors, everyone knows each other, they take care of each other, and there's a one degree of separation.

So it mirrors my childhood in so many ways, because I grew up in a very tight-knit community.

And just, we love being here.

-What makes you a little emotional about that?

-You know, I think it's the aspect behind the human connection, right?

In our society, in our world, we live in a place where there's a lot of attempting to divide us, right?

You either have it, either/or.

And I grew up with a "both and" mentality from my family.

And so the opportunity that I get to be a part of that... And quite frankly, Amber, you mentioned it at the beginning of the segment, but the fact that I am sitting in this seat serving Catholic Charities and thousands of people was just never in my history card to do, but here I am.

-Yeah.

And what do you mean by "both and"?

-Yeah.

Well, you know, we like to try to pigeon people between either you're either this or you're that, when reality is things can be a both-and approach.

And I think if you can approach things from a standpoint of an abundance mentality, that's where that "both and" comes from.

And when you look at things from a potential abundance, it changes your perspective on life, it changes your perspective on serving people and sharing what you have with others.

-When I first met you in person today, you said, "It's a great day."

And I said, "Well, is it?"

And you said, yeah.

I mean, it's helpful to remind yourself of that abundance perspective.

Is that what you're talking about?

-Absolutely, without a doubt.

And, you know, even at the office, I get out of my office at the campus for Catholic Charities.

It's very important for me.

I don't sit in my office all day in meetings, and I like to get out.

I like to walk the campus.

I like to go and visit with the clients, hear what their day is, what's going on with them.

It puts everything into perspective when we're going to make decisions.

-You told the Las Vegas Review-Journal that every day you get your breath taken away two times.

It's when you are driving from your home to Catholic Charities and you see the sunrise-- -Yes.

- --and then when you get to Catholic Charities and you see the amount of homeless people outside.

-Yes.

-That has to be, has to be so difficult.

And how do you apply that perspective of abundance to that situation?

-You know, I don't know if I have a, like, a clean answer for that in that way.

It's about a mindset.

It genuinely is about a mindset and about being grateful for what you have and focusing on that gratitude and then trying to give it to others, because life happens to all of us.

Life is hard.

Nobody was ever guaranteed an easy life.

And so my perspective is if we're all working together and we're helping each other out--even in our darkest moments--it makes it much more palpable to get through, not just to survive it, but to thrive through it, and get to the other side and be something even better than you were before.

-This life of service, where does this stem from?

Did you grow up knowing you wanted to be in some way useful to society, or... Because I did mention you didn't want to get into social work.

You originally wanted to work at a children's hospital.

-Yes.

I wanted to be a child psychiatrist at a children's hospital for children that had terminal illnesses and how to make those last moments of their life and their family's life have some joy in it.

That's what I thought I was going to do, and it wasn't-- It was when I was in undergrad at Texas Tech.

I was actually in my last 30 hours of school, and I had minored in social work with a major in psychology.

And one of my social work professors pulled me into his office and asked me why I did not major in social work.

And so I told him what I was going to do, Amber, and he said great.

And this is before the internet was really big.

So he said great.

He handed me a Houston, Texas, phone book and said, I want you to call every hospital and ask them who they have on staff.

And so I called.

I sat in his office for hours calling every single hospital.

And when I would ask them, Who do you have on staff?

Their response was, Social workers.

And so when I hung up the phone, I made a commitment to Professor Crabtree--and this was 26 years ago--that I would go get my master's in social work.

-And that's-- But you didn't end up in hospitals.

-I did not.

-You started with the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services.

-Yes.

-What were you doing there?

And, geesh, it's like you're drawn to really difficult situations to helping people in some really tough times.

-Yeah.

So when I was in grad school, it came the time when we-- it was time for us to plan our internships.

So again, we pulled out this big three-ring binder, looking through all the opportunities, and I will never forget this.

There was a group of us sitting around looking at them, and Child Protective Service, a high-risk investigator for Child Protective Services, was an opportunity.

And everyone wrinkled their nose and was like, no, I'm not doing that.

And I did the exact same thing.

I got home that evening, and I still hadn't found which internship I was most interested in.

But I got home that evening and started reflecting back, like, why did I have judgment on Child Protective Services when I have no experience with it?

So I decided I would go and do an internship with them, and I had no clue that after one internship I'd end up working with them for multiple years doing high-risk investigations.

-Meaning what?

-So for a high-risk investigation in Texas, it is children under the age of four are considered high risk because they're solely reliant on an adult to care for them.

They typically can't speak for themselves, they're not in school, and they rely on a caretaker for all of their needs.

And so the unit that I was in, we did investigations for children that were under the age of four when there was a concern brought forward.

-This is all such very hard work.

-It is.

-How are you still thriving, surviving?

-Because I have an amazing support system that, Amber-- And even when I think back to my families at Child Protective Services that I worked with to the 22 years in the Catholic Charities Network, even though everyone's scenarios and hardships are different, you can break it back down to the basic of is there-- did they have a support system?

And not, did somebody love them?

That's totally different.

A support system that had the knowledge and the tools to give you good mentorship, guidance, and advice.

And I had that growing up, no clue how lucky I was to have that and how rare that really is.

And I want to spread it in abundance.

-Part of that support system, I imagine, is your husband-- -Yes.

- --who I read is Catholic.

-Yes.

-But that's not why you became Catholic?

-It's not.

-Why did you and when?

-So Ray and I, actually we got married in September of 2004.

And right after we got married, a dear friend worked for Catholic Charities Fort Worth, who I went to grad school with.

And she called and said, Sara, there is an opportunity at Catholic Charities.

You gotta come over here.

And it was still working with children who were victims of child abuse and neglect but on the opposite side.

So it wasn't doing investigations and removals; it was how to get the family back together.

And so I started there in October of 2004 and, Amber, about a month into the job, I came in and said, I have found my dream job--not my dream company, I found my dream job.

Like I was, I'm going to die at this desk, because 20 kids are here every day.

We're reuniting families.

We're helping them heal those scars so that they can live out their God-given gifts and talents.

And I'll tell you 22 years later, three Catholic Charities later, it wasn't that I'd found my dream job, I found that I'd found my dream company.

And so, going back just a little bit, I started with Catholic Charities in 2004, married Ray in 2004, and it wasn't until six years later that I joined the Catholic Church.

I fell in love with the Catholic social teachings, because that's the foundation of Catholic Charities.

I fell in love with it, so I decided if I like that so much, maybe I should go learn a little more about the church.

Jokingly, I like to say, God was knocking the whole time.

I was just stubborn and not listening to Him.

[laughter] -I have enjoyed looking at your LinkedIn, because it's unique in that you write these end-of-week reflections that are eye-opening.

A recent one talked about a man who came to the shelter, and he was 100 years old.

-Yes.

-Here in Las Vegas?

-I have goose bumps.

-What did that make you think?

-You know, it really does.

Just like I had kind of said in my reflection, there are moments in this work that you stop and go, How did we get here as a society?

Like, really, how did we get here?

But then, just as quickly, you ask the question, What are we going to do about it?

We can sit and complain all day long, or we can take action and really make an impact.

And for that gentleman, I really think about that 100 years on this earth and for all of the life that he has lived, and he walked in with gratitude.

He wasn't complaining.

He wasn't, you know, asking for anything more than, Do you have a place that I can sleep tonight?

But I will tell you, he did not-- And nobody belongs in our shelter, but a 100-year-old gentleman definitely does not.

And the inspiration that I get is from the 300 employees that I work with every single day.

I work alongside them.

They don't work for me.

We work together.

And the fact that the minute they realized that there wasn't a mistake on his ID, that he really was 100, they got to work quietly, efficiently, immediately to say he cannot stay in the shelter.

And but what was so beautiful about it, while they were working on that aspect of finding stable housing, they made sure he was seen.

We made sure he had a bed and he had food, and they took very gentle care of him in that process.

And my greatest hope is that where he is today--he is in stable, secure housing--but when he looks back over his life, he remembers the dignity we gave him.

-And I hope you can fit this into 30 seconds, but dignity is very important to you.

When did it become so important?

-I think it's been an evolution from my time, even at Child Protective Services, that, again, families in their hardest hours and their hardest moments, people don't want to be remembered for their hardest moment.

-Sara Ramirez, CEO and President of Catholic Charities of Southern Nevada, thank you so much for joining Nevada Week In Person.

-Thank you for having me.