ASP's
Angels, Katrina Bundy '07 of
Dayton, OH, Marc Hong '07 of Salt Lake
City, UT
and Katie Matonich '08 of Davison, MI,
prepare to battle the
bathrooms at the the end of the week
“...Yours are the eyes through which Christ’s compassion
looks out on the world. Yours are the feet with which He is to go about
doing good things and yours are the hands with which He is to bless us
now.”
--St. Teresa of Avila
T his week at the Appalachia Service Project has changed the lives of many of the group members. Through our service, we truly felt like the hands of Christ. We have interacted together and with families from the area, showing nothing but love and compassion.
Waking up this morning was particularly hard knowing that we were venturing out to the worksites for the last time. The more complicated tasks of the week were the last things we thought about, because this was a week of simplifying. We thought more about the impact our work would have on the families’ futures. From the bathroom that was built by one group, to the updating of an irrigation system for a safer home by another group, we felt as if we made a difference during our short week of work.
Today was a day filled with laughter and creativity. The group that was working on attaching gutters made their own scaffolding out of nearby cinder blocks and planks of wood, having to hold the people on top of the blocks by their legs while sliding around on the muddy hill behind the home. This was not the only laughter had by members of our group. The group that worked on the bathroom encountered many obstacles and took to inside jokes and out of context phrases to get them through the rough spots of putting in new flooring and putting up the last pieces of drywall.
(top)Katie Matonich '08 of Davison, MI,
Melissa Carstens '08 of Marquette, MI
and Heather Richardson '07 of St. Louis, MI
work together to prepare floor boards for their family's kitchen
as their new friend, Teddy, admires their work.
(bottom)This group spent the majority of Wednesday
through Friday making progress on a bathroom in their family's home.
The words of the evening devotion were simple and well-stated. No person could express how much this week in Chavies, Kentucky has meant to them. Looking around the prayer circle the group members no longer just saw the faces of Alma College students and faculty; we saw the faces of friends and of fellow brothers and sisters in Christ.
Story by Katie Matonich ‘08 Photos, captions and layout by Tom Harding ’07 and Sarah DeYoung ‘07
(left) Carol Gregg, Director of Discovering Vocations, and Tom Harding '07 of Grosse Pointe, MI use their height and their brains to measure and apply soffet to their family's home. (right) The entire group is proud of the work they accomplished in the two days they worked at the site, including the gutters that took a lot of teamwork to hang.
