Read about a past service trip...
Article written about Wake Forest trip to New Orleansby Marisa Menedes (WFU '08)
(who is currently serving as an AmeriCorps Volunteer there for a year)
At
the beginning of every year, the Wake Forest Catholic Community organizes a
mission trip to travel to another region and help the less fortunate. Last
year, eight students of WFCC, including myself, traveled with Father Jude
DeAngelo to New Orleans, Louisiana to help the reconstruction efforts
of the hurricane ravaged city. We managed to gut three houses in a week of hard
manual labor. We would work 
A Catholic School, post Katrinafrom 9 a.m. to about 5 p.m. and later in the
evening gather together for mass, as well as a prayer and reflection time,
during which we shared our feelings about our difficult day's work. These
feelings ranged from despair to joy, as throughout the day we remained stunned
at the damage done to the area, but then found comfort in the gratefulness and
determination of the homeowners. The two homeowners we met on this trip were
two of the strongest and kindest women I had ever met and definitely brought a
personal touch to the tragedy that had befallen so many of our fellow citizens.
The first homeowner we met, Ms. Sarah, worked along side us all day helping us move the trash we dropped outside of her home to the curb, where it was picked up after we had created a mountain of plaster, floorboards, and photographs; she picked flowers as souvenirs and put them in our hair (or lack thereof). Ms. Althea called herself a "water-walker" and exclaimed that this was her "year of jubilee!" The year certainly started out that way, as she had her house gutted and received the money from the insurance company necessary to rebuild her home. The third homeowners had not been able to return to Louisiana yet because the family had not been able to obtain a FEMA trailer, so we took down a Cinderella clock, marking the time the water had covered it, and broke down pink walls, wondering how the family would feel when they walked in and saw the hollowness of their home.
On our last night in New Orleans, the group decided to annually travel to New Orleans for the mission trip. Although exhausted from our work, our small group of nine people had allowed three families to take the first step forward to rebuild, not only their houses, but also their lives in New Orleans. The trip is a positive way to start off a new year and a new semester, feeling grateful for your blessings in life and knowing that you have blessed someone else's in such a meaningful way.