St. Joseph Church in Hawthorne will play host to this year's Justice and Peace Dinner honoring organizations, parishes and service centers that are working for justice and peace in their communities.

At the Nov. 6 event, coordinated by the archdiocesan Office of Peace and Justice, the Catholic Campaign for Human Development (CCHD) will present 22 organizations with grants totaling $448,000 to continue their vital community service efforts.

"CCHD funds organizations working to end poverty in their communities -- poor and low-income people working to change the conditions that keep them living in a state of poverty," said Joan Harper, archdiocesan CCHD coordinator.

Cardinal Roger Mahony will present this year's Empowerment Award to the Garment Worker Center, honoring the organization for its success in winning $1.2 million in back wages for a group of low-wage garment workers in Los Angeles.

The Garment Worker Center was started in 2001 to empower garment workers to advocate for their rights as workers, immigrants, and women. In Los Angeles, the nation's largest garment manufacturing area, the organization gives workers the tools to assert their rights to minimum wage and overtime, to health and safety, and to a workplace free of discrimination.

Groups receiving $10,000 CCHD grants this year include Community Asset Development Re-Defining Education, Community Voice-LA, Ex-Offender Action Network, Greater Long Beach Interfaith Community Organization, Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy, Los Angeles Community Action Network, Multi-Ethnic Immigrant Worker Organizing Network, Parents Organized for Westside Renewal, and Proyecto Pastoral/Cominidad en Movimento.

Receiving Parish Justice Awards for their work in social justice ministry are Our Lady of the Holy Rosary, Sun Valley; Precious Blood, Los Angeles; St. Dorothy, Glendora; St. Mark's University Parish, Goleta; and St. Francis Xavier, Pico Rivera.

Each year during Lent, Catholic Relief Services teams with local parishes and Catholic schools to launch Operation Rice Bowl, which funds food pantries in the area.

This year's recipients of the $3,000 Operation Rice Bowl grants are parish food pantries at St. Gregory the Great, Whittier; St. Sebastian, Santa Paula; Our Lady of Solitude, East L.A.; and St. Thomas the Apostle, Los Angeles, plus Our Lady of Guadalupe Center, Canoga Park.

For more information on the CCHD dinner, call (213) 637-7560.