A Question about Helping Neighbors You Don't Know

Our friend Melene, who lives in North Carolina, asked us to pray for a family in our neighborhood that was in serious need. Melene's husband was deployed with our neighbor's husband, who arrived home yesterday and will care for his wife during a very-risky brain surgery.

We hadn't met the family until recently, and so far we've only met the children and their aunt. The aunt, by the way, lost everything in Katrina and now lives here and cares for her sister's 4 children while she tries to cope with the daily pain associated with loss of brain fluid. There are serious needs all around.

This family is Catholic and may be getting assistance from their church; we don't know. So my question is what is the proper thing for us to do?

In addition to prayer, our current plan is to take them a meal and ask if their church is providing meals and other assistance. If they need help, we want to provide it; but we don't want to be too pushy since we're strangers who happen to live near-by. Other thoughts?