Youth volunteers from the Arkansas team.
Photo: Karen Howard

Fourteen people gathered for the Arkansas Presbytery Youth Council Mission Trip ’08.  This team of high school youth, college students and adults, came together as missionaries in search of the face of God in the Bayous of the Gulf Coast, in the hearts of each other, in the faces of the Louisiana natives and in the stories of tragedy that still linger three years after Hurricanes Katrina and Rita hit the area.

Presbyterian Disaster Assistance organized their first youth mission week at the “Good Earth” Presbyterian Volunteer Village in Houma, Louisiana — south of New Orleans.  Our team met with three other youth teams from Iowa, Kansas and Illinois to reach out and work on homes along five bayous extending out like fingers from the city of Houma.

The site for the Presbyterian Volunteer Village in Houma was donated by the local Elks Lodge.  In collaboration, the Presbytery of Giddings-Lovejoy and PDA constructed a permanent building to be used as a kitchen/dining/meeting area with indoor bathrooms, heating and air conditioning.  This was the center of the camp where the teams from around the country came together to connect with each other and gain spiritual and physical sustenance to take on each day of hard work.  It was also the place where the volunteers could relax each evening in a community with a common goal — to see the face of God.

Terrebone Recovery Assistance Coordination (TRAC) handles case management for the recovery efforts in southern Louisiana.

Each team was assigned to a project for the week.  The Arkansas team was assigned the task of demolishing a portion of a condemned house belonging to Gloria, who will turn 80 in August of this year. Ms. Gloria raised six of her seven children in this house that her husband, who passed away one week after Hurricane Rita flooded the area, expanded years ago for their growing family.  We heard many stories from Ms. Gloria this week of the life she shared with her husband, of raising her children and of hard work.  There were stories of growing up in the area, stories of the love she has for her family, stories of the hurricane and of the flooding.  And in these stories and memories, the Arkansas team experienced the love that was nurtured and kept alive through the years, memories surrounded by the walls of this condemned house, walls that contained and protected the family for years — the very walls that we were there to tear down.