Early on Oct. 15, most students would be getting ready for school, but 18 were at gate C10 waiting for the start of five days of hard work.

St. Croix Catholic Youth Group went to the South Bronx in New York over Oct. break to do mission work. They spent four days helping the Sisters of Life and the Franciscan Friars of Renewal. This included cleaning homeless shelters and baking food for those living on the streets.

Sophomore Teresa Romportl said, “The sisters at the convent were just so happy for us to be there and made us feel like we were the most important people.”

The Sisters of Life are a religious group of women that help mothers in crisis. They let pregnant women to live in one of their convents and provide help also.

“There was a homeless man at the park that one of the sisters were takings us on a walk through. He had about three teeth and a lisp but sister knew his name and talked to him and he was so happy to see her. It showed how much dignity the sisters gave to everyone and how the people loved them,” said Romportl.

Another group that they worked with was the Franciscan Friars of the Renewal. The brothers work with the materially poor, especially those that are homeless. They do this by living in areas where there are many homeless people live and opening their doors for them. They take in 25 to 30 men for a night and providing two meals. The Friars run soup kitchens and youth programs for those on the streets.They have no possessions of their own, and everything they do have is from charity.

“My group baked a cake for one of the homeless men. He didn’t know his own birthday, so the Friars went out of their way to celebrate it with him,” said sophomore Brooke Espelien.

When arriving at the location where they were to stay, an unexpected complication arose. Pipes had burst, flooding at the church the youth group was to stay at. Quickly, their youth director called and found an abandoned convent nearby.

Chaperone Isaac Jensen said, “The generosity there was huge. With the place we were going to stay at unavailable, the church said that we could stay at the convent.They started feeding us and set up rooms right away. The joy everywhere was very uplifting.”

One of the takeaways from Esplien’s point of view was that she realized how lucky people who live in Stillwater are, and how many things everyone takes for granted. This made her more humble with realizing more about things outside of Stillwater.