Southington Youth Group Participates in Building Habitat Houses in Baltimore
By Bill Yelenak
WASHINGTON–High school students from the First Congregational Church in Southington are preparing to come to the District Friday, where they will tour various landmarks and then go to Baltimore to build houses in with Habitat for Humanity.
The Rev. Rick Haverly, one of the chaperones who will be traveling with the group, said students from the church routinely go on mission trips every year to do community service. Trips in the past have sent students to work at Habitat in Baltimore, serve food at soup kitchens in New York City and help out at a church in Mazatlan, Mexico, according to Haverly.
“When I first began doing the youth groups when I started the division at the church, I wanted to get the youth involved in some mission work,” Haverly, an associate minister of the First Congregational Church, said.
Haverly said approximately 24 students will attend the mission trip to build houses near Baltimore’s old Memorial Stadium. They will be working Tuesday through Friday for Chesapeake Habitat for Humanity, according to Haverly.
“This was one that somebody had recommended to me and said it was well organized and a good program to work with,” he said.
The group will return to Connecticut on Feb. 22, Haverly said.
“We’re actually staying in some Habitat housing that last time we were down there we were actually building,” Haverly said. “Now, they use it to house groups that come down to volunteer.”
Haverly said he believes the mission trip helps the students to come together to do something positive for other people.
“It’s just a way of finding different ways to work for people in need,” Haverly said. “They can have something they can contribute to people and benefit that way.”
Students going on the mission trip said they were excited at the prospect of being able to help people. Chris Bushnell, a 14-year-old freshman at Southington High School, said his brother had gone on mission trips before and told him “how fun it was,” so he decided to go.
“And I get community service hours which I have to do in order to get confirmed this year,” said Chris, who needs 24 hours of community service, in addition to a year-long class, in order to be confirmed and become a member of the church.
His brother, Patrick, a 18-year-old Southington High senior, said he went on his first trip for similar reasons, but it turned out to be much more rewarding.
“Before I went on the trip, I was just going to do it because it was just a bunch of community service hours for conformation,” Patrick said. “But it turned out just being a really memorable experience. Basically, it just started me off on the right foot.”
Patrick will be attending his fourth church mission trip, returning to Baltimore, where he did his first mission trip during his freshman year in high school. Patrick helped build Habitat’s Visitors’ Center, where they will be staying this time, on his trip three years ago.
“It’s the same neighborhood we worked in last time, so I just want to see how it’s progressed over three years,” Patrick said.
Haverly said that over the weekend, the students plan to tour such Washington landmarks as the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, the Washington National Cathedral and the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, where he said he hoped there was something for the youths to see about the Columbia space shuttle tragedy.
Chris said he was most interested in seeing the Holocaust Memorial Museum.
“I’ve never been there and I’m looking forward to that because we read about it in school and we hear about it all the time,” Chris said. “I just want to see what it’s actually like.”
Patrick said he is making his first trip back to the Washington area since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and he said he was wondering about how the city would have changed since then, especially considering the new threats announced recently.
“Actually, I’ve been racking my brain trying to figure out how different it’s going to be from three years ago with all the heightened security and the bomb scares and stuff,” Patrick said. “I’ve been having second thoughts about it. I’m still going to go, but it was worrying me a little.”
Bill Yelenak, a Boston University student, works at the Boston University Washington News Service in Washington, D.C. His telephone number is 202-756-2860 ext: 114 and his email is byelenak@newbritainherald.com.
Published in The New Britain Herald, in Connecticut.
