Hi, my name is Annie, and I
was lucky enough to go on the trip to Nazareth Farm last week.
Simplicity, Community, Service and Prayer are
the 4 corner stones of Nazareth Farm.
Throughout the week we lived these cornerstones and came together as one big, happy family with God. The first day as we piled out of big van that would
soon be named “Otto,” we were embraced by all the staff members with a hug and welcome home. With confused faces, we hugged
these new people without knowing that in the next week we wouldn’t want to let
go of them.
We were introduced to the
cornerstone of simplicity on the first day when we had to put all electronics
away. Also, they ask you to not wear any makeup because the
real you is the most beautiful you. As
the first day progressed, we toured to see the outhouse (which I did clean
one day), the compost pile, and the bucket showers. Another piece of simplicity is only taking 2-bucket showers and one real shower in the 6 days we were
there. The simplicity
cornerstone is taken very seriously at Nazareth Farm; we are not allowed to
know the time. It is always 10:10, God’s time, because when Jesus was crucified
his hands stayed at 10 and 2, 10 minutes after the hour.
The
cornerstone of community is my favorite cornerstone. One person in particular
stood out to me, and if anyone in church today was on the trip they know whom I’m
going to say, Bernadette. I was lucky
enough to meet a new best friend on the trip; if we weren’t together, we were
screaming each others name trying to find each other. People couldn’t believe
we had just met. On the last day I kept my tears inside until we had to hug and
say goodbye, it was one of the hardest goodbyes I have ever had to say. After our 6th hug and more tears
than you could imagine we finally went our separate ways into our vans. Although
we only knew each other for 6 days we had a bond that no one else could
understand. I have 2 families now, it’s
unbelievable how you can live with people for only 6 days and feel like a
family.
The next cornerstone is service;
this is the biggest cornerstone at Nazareth Farm. Every morning we would wake
up and do chores around the farm before breakfast. Then we would pile into our
vans and go to our worksites. The first night there had been a terrible storm. We were flooded into the Farm and had to stay home, luckily I was on home
crew that day. We stayed inside to make meals, clean the house, and welcome
everyone else home. Tuesday was probably
the toughest workday of the week. We took a half hour drive to George and
Debra’s house to put up vinyl siding, which is the most difficult thing to cut
and nail onto a house. George is one of
the nicest and funniest people I have ever met; he kept us entertained all day
with his stories about all of his crazy adventures with his friends - but all 8
of us on our work crew got a different version of the same story. The next day we went to Joel and Mary’s
house. They have a 3-year-old daughter named Alyssa and 4 dogs. We put trim onto their porch and stained the
porch floor. When lunch-time rolled around Alyssa insisted on eating with us. When our work was day was done, you could see a few tears rolling down her
face. It’s seeing the happiness and gratitude of all of the families we worked
with that made the week more enjoyable and rewarding.
Prayer is the final cornerstone of
Nazareth Farm and while on the farm your whole life is devoted to God. Before doing anything in the morning we had Morning
Prayer; every group would plan prayer however they liked it. The first
prayer the staff planned, we got into small groups and discussed the 4
cornerstones. I met a boy named Jon in
this group. He was so passionate and happy, but then he shared how he lost his
father at a young age, and how he has tried to live his life in a way his father
would have wanted. At the end of the week Jon told the full story of his father
during evening prayer. I saw God in Jon and I believe I met Jon to show me that
even through the toughest times in your life God walks with you. We celebrated Mass twice at Nazareth Farm. Father Joe from Long Island led mass and being in the small, intimate setting
made me feel fully surrounded by God. My
favorite prayer was the one everyday before we left for the worksites. We
all gathered into one big circle in the parking lot, joined hands, and someone said prayer - Bernadette and I always insisted on standing on either side of
Father Joe for prayer. One day we were
standing around waiting for everyone to come to the parking lot and someone
suggested we “pass the squeeze” so everyone closed their eyes and waited for
their hand to be squeezed so they could pass it to the next person. I don’t know what it was about that
experience, but it sticks out in my mind, such a small thing, but it meant so
much to me.
I will end by saying thank you to
everyone who helped us make this trip possible, whether it was getting your car
washed, buying a baked good or just praying for us while we were gone. I will never forget this experience because
it has truly changed my life.
“Expect A Miracle”.
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