Approximately 275 Catholic teens and adults participated in the Micah Experience Work Camp from July 26-31, performing free repairs at the homes of 45 elderly, handicapped and low-income residents in the Baltimore area.
The work camp was co-sponsored by the Archdiocese of Baltimore and the Group Workcamps Foundation, a volunteer home-repair organization based in Loveland, Colo.
According to Diana Healy, the local project coordinator, teens from Connecticut, Massachusetts, Michigan, New York and Wisconsin participated.
They were joined by contingents from St. Elizabeth Ann Seton in Crofton and St. Jane de Frances de Chantal in Pasadena, which were headed by youth minister Melissa Serafin and group leader Jack O’Malley, respectively.
Approximately $20,000 for material and tools was raised for the work camp in the archdiocese, thanks to the Division of Youth and Young Adult Ministry, the archbishop’s annual appeal, the two aforementioned parishes and others in Baltimore City and Anne Arundel County.
The other sponsoring parishes were St. Athanasius in Curtis Bay, St. Bernadette in Severn, Holy Trinity in Glen Burnie, St. John the Evangelist in Severna Park, St. Leo in Little Italy, Our Lady of the Chesapeake in Lake Shore, Our Lady of the Fields in Millersville, St. Rose of Lima in Brooklyn and St. Veronica in Cherry Hill.
Visitors stayed in temporary quarters at Archbishop Spalding High School in Severn, where over 20 archdiocesan priests led a reconciliation service July 30 and liturgy throughout the week. Deacon Paul Gifford of St. Clement in Lansdowne helped coordinate the litugies.
The Knights of Columbus and local parish ministries provided a welcome reception and daily hospitality for the teens.
Working in groups of six, the teens and adults performed over 10,000 volunteer hours. Their outreach went from rowhomes in the city to Pasadena, where two crews built a ramp at the home of Hope Fangman, a six-year-old with cerebral palsy.