College students give needy
a 'spring' break
Joe Kohn of The Michigan Catholic
Published March 24, 2006
Detroit For many a college student, the term "spring break" conjures images of sandy beaches, partying and taking it easy.
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Students Nicole Thompson from Henry FordCommunityCollege and Ross Brickerson from University of MichiganDearborn stand in a flood-damaged house in New Orleans, holding a "Home Sweet Home" sign. | But this year, for several students in Catholic campus ministries across the Archdiocese of Detroit, it meant something eternally more: answering Christ's call to serve the needy.
Attending spring break mission trips with the campus ministries, several students from Detroit-area colleges went to either New Orleans or Tijuana, Mexico, to help build better lives for those in dire living situations.
"Christianity is action," said Jacquelyn McNaughton, 26, a student at Wayne State University who spent her spring break helping the impoverished in Tijuana. "It's about taking action in the society that we're in and dealing with the problems."
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Sean McConnell helps paint walls of a building in Tijuana, where students helped to aid migrant workers. | About a dozen students from University of Michigan-Dearborn, Henry Ford Community College in Dearborn, and Oakland University in Rochester Hills went to Blessed Francis Xavier Seelos Parish in New Orleans to help restore the church, which went through a fire, and homes of parishioners. They saw first-hand the fallout from Hurricane Katrina, which destroyed thousands of homes.
"Things were in much worse condition than what the media showed, and this was six months later," said Becky Bajoka, an 18-year-old Oakland University student and a parishioner at Our Lady of Refuge Parish in Orchard Lake. "It was truly a sad sight."
Students from the New Orleans group said their most touching experience was removing the ruined furnishings from a house that belonged to a couple parishioners.
The students removed everything the couple owned and laid it out on the front lawn, the ravaged remains of their home.
"I just had to stop looking them in the eye to keep from crying," said Justine Flores, 20, a parishioner at Christ the King Parish in Detroit and a sociology major at University of Michigan-Dearborn.
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Students from University of Michigan-Dearborn, Henry Ford Community College and OaklandUniversity celebrate after havingremoved debris from a flood-damagedhouse in New Orleans. | The group of nine from Wayne State University helped the Scalabrini Fathers religious order at their mission, La Casa del Migrante, which is a shelter for migrants in Tijuana. Tijuana borders California; thousands of migrants wait hours at the border each morning to enter the United States to work.
In addition to serving at a community shelter, outreach centers and a soup kitchen, the students traveled to a local dump.
Many migrants lived in houses on the inactive part of the dump.
"There was garbage everywhere," said Aaron Tomchuck, 21, a student and a parishioner at St. Michael Parish, Livonia. "The houses were really just shacks at best."
 'Spring'ing to action
Students from Detroit-area colleges joined their Catholic campus ministries to:
Help repair a fire-damaged church in New Orleans
Build up houses in Mexico, where migrant workers lived in a dump
Clean out homes that were damaged by Hurricane Katrina and subsequent flooding
Serve at soup kitchens and community shelters; and
See Christ's healing presence amid true poverty and devastation. To find the Catholic campus ministry at your Detroit-area college, call (313) 237-4680. | The Detroit-area students helped them drywall houses.
The spring break mission experiences, said Megan Maloney, campus minister at UM Dearborn, were meant both to help those in need and to foster compassion and gratitude in the students.
"We are the Body of Christ and it's through us that He can go down there and talk to people in need," Maloney said. "It's the experience, really, for the kingdom of God where people are fulfilling needs and loving one another."
The students said they valued being there first-hand amid poverty and devastation.
"You can't help anybody if you don't know what's going on," said Zach Moore, a psychology major at Wayne State University and a Catholic from the Diocese of Kalamazoo. "Getting out there and getting a better idea of what other people's lives are like influences every decision you make."
Flores said working and praying with her peers, and seeing joy from those whose lives were ravaged in New Orleans, made her realize that God is there, even in the hard times.
"After seeing the total devastation, some may feel that God is nowhere to be found," Flores said. "But we did find God in all the people we met who had been through hell."
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Rachel Reaume of Wayne State University talks to those who live in a dump in Tijuana. Many families own homes on the inactive part of the dump. Students from Detroit-area colleges joined Catholic campus ministries on spring break mission trips to Tijuana and New Orleans. | Tomchuck said it expanded his view of the world.
"It's so easy to get wrapped up in your own little world of worries and problems, and they seem so bad," he said. "Then to take a step back and go to a place like Tijuana you realize that you don't have it so bad."
Some of the students said their trip may be over but their mission isn't.
That continues by urging others to help the needy.
"It's our duty to go in there and educate ourselves," said McNaughton, who said she'll be giving a speech about her trip in one of her classes at Wayne State University. "We came back to Detroit with a lot of information we can share with others.
"When you get down there, you really understand what you can do as an individual."
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