This summer, our Director of Mission and DEI, Mary-Kate Tracy, Campus Minister Kathleen Furey, and four wonderful Ursuline students traveled to Bethlehem Farm in West Virginia to serve.
After a seven-hundred mile, ten hour journey, we were welcomed to Bethlehem Farm in Alderson, West Virginia with the words, ‘Welcome Home’. How unusual to be so far from our families and all that was familiar in Boston to be ‘welcomed home’ deep in the Appalachian mountains! Yet, the warmth of the caretakers and summer servants at this intentional, Christian community was so generous in hospitality that we were placed immediately at ease.
It was equally inviting to be met by community members from our Ursuline sister schools from Dallas, New Orleans, and St. Louis. Months of shared preparation and prayer had led to this week of sister school service, rooted in our common heritage, mission, and core values. We were eager to live St. Angela’s spirit of Serviam together.
As the week progressed through a cycle of daily prayer, shared work, and community meals, students and staff members grew to depend upon one another deeply. From learning the basics of home repair by practicing with circular saws and screw guns, to applying these new skills by restoring porches, patching drywall, and installing new roofs, Ursuline community members spread across three counties to build relationship with and improve the homes of residents most in need in West Virginia. Bethlehem Farm’s cornerstones of service, prayer, simplicity, and community were easily applied each day as we developed an understanding of and worked toward social justice.
Cool summer evenings at the bunkhouse brought joyful conversations from porch swings and games of capture the flag in magical fields filled with fireflies under the full moon. The summer solstice offered the opportunity to honor the earth by learning about sustainable practices including water conservation, electricity fasts, and composting. Above all, we were introduced to a way of life which allowed us to embrace Gospel values, immerse ourselves in the care for God’s creation, and focus on the inherent dignity of each person encountered at Bethlehem Farm.
Without cell phones, watches, and makeup, we encountered a different way of life and grew in our relationships with one another and with God. ‘Welcome Home’ is no longer a greeting to us any longer, it is a way of life and love that St. Angela would say, “is engraved upon our hearts forever”.
