St. Michael’s youth provides aid to Appalachia (Video)

St. Michael’s Church in Cranford celebrated the 20th anniversary of its annual “Appalachia Mission Week” from April 1-6. On Easter Monday, 18 members of the church’s youth group boarded a bus and journeyed to Waynesburg, an economically challenged region of Greene County, Pa. to aid the local parish and impoverished residents with construction projects and other necessities.

This milestone comes as the program resumes for the second consecutive year after a hiatus due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Richard Donovan, Youth Minister at St. Michael’s Church and associate director of the Archdiocese of Newark’s Office for Youth and Young Adult Ministry, said the groups he has taken on the trip have undertaken diverse tasks over the years. “We’ve done roof projects, handicap ramps, porches, you name it, and we did it all,” he said.

Donovan said that beyond the tangible outcomes, the mission week provides a unique educational opportunity for youth, offering hands-on lessons in construction and the value of community service.

Olivia Padovano, one of the youths who attended the trip, said that she applied for the trip because she felt a calling to serve others.

“I know that God’s mission is for me to serve others and I truly felt God’s presence throughout the entire week,” Padovano said. “Being able to help others who were struggling in a time of need allowed me to build a stronger relationship with God.”

This year, the young volunteers embarked on a journey to the Diocese of Pittsburgh, where they dedicated their efforts to serving Saint Matthias Parish. The parish encompasses four active churches and seven total properties, spanning over a 30-mile radius.

Upon their arrival in Waynesburg on April 1, the group celebrated Mass with Father Thomas Lewandowski, the pastor at Saint Matthias Parish.

The students cleaned churches, replaced flooring in a family’s trailer in nearby Morgantown, W. Va., constructed picnic tables for use in a community park in Waynesburg, and volunteered with local organizations such as Catholic Charities and the United Way.

Each night, according to Padovano, the participants reflected on their days’ work and how they experienced the presence of Christ in their daily encounters and activities.

The people she met on the trip helped her grow in her faith. “I truly saw Christ in everyone who was involved,” she said, noting her fellow participants’ passion and dedication to community service.

Interested youth are invited to learn about the trip in January, according to Donovan. In addition to a fee of $150, participants commit to fundraising efforts through events like pancake breakfasts, pasta nights, and sales of palm crosses and Easter flowers to cover the cost of the social service trip. St. Michael’s also hosts collections during Mass, and participants solicit their sponsors. All funds raised contribute toward travel, accommodation, and food. The group also supplies all the construction materials, tools, and safety equipment needed to complete the projects.

According to Donovan, the origins of the “Appalachia Mission Week” can be traced back to the 1980s, when the Archdiocese of Newark initiated a program called the “ARK Service Week.” The program allowed parish teams to serve impoverished communities in West Virginia. Inspired by this initiative, Donovan and other youth ministers at local parishes sustained the tradition after the archdiocese shuttered the program in the mid-1990s.

As the program’s scope and popularity grew at St. Michael’s, it eventually evolved into a parish-specific mission trip.

Over the years, the program evolved significantly. In the past, the church collaborated with the Wiles Hill Community Center in Morgantown, W. Va., to identify residents in need of home repairs but faced financial constraints. Parishioners would then undertake the projects, ranging from roofing to building handicap ramps and porches.

The program paused during the COVID-19 pandemic, and in 2022, the church was forced to move the mission trip to a new location due to staffing constraints at the Wiles Hill Community Center. The mission week resumed last year with a trip to Perryopolis, Pa., within the Diocese of Greensburg. There, participants engaged in activities such as renovating a convent building and constructing a porch for a local family.