The locals knew why we were there, walking through town in our work clothes, hiking boots, and Home Depot tool belts. Many came over to profoundly thank us. I found it a little overwhelming since the work we were able to do didn’t even scratch the surface of what was needed. But then I realized that most of our mission was accomplished by simply being there. We left our lives back home for a few days to stand with our brothers and sisters in New Orleans and to keep their story alive. Our country has moved on to immigration reform and low poll ratings, but New Orleans is still in ruins. I was shocked by the devastation and by the limited progress that has been made. The city is tied up in a big ball of red tape. So, in addition to the demolition work and rebuilding, our purpose was to be a witness to the damage and hardship, and to let Katrina families know that we have not forgotten them.

--Debbie Frisch

I spoke with one of the potential homeowners in the Musician’s Village [in New Orleans]. After thanking us for coming there she said, “I hope people don’t forget us and think that everything is now OK. We’re not OK yet. We have a long way to go.” One of the things we can do after the trip is to let people know about how much is left to do. The folks in New Orleans and elsewhere in the Gulf Coast will need continued help and support for some time to come.

--Rich Cirillo

It didn’t matter who you were,
it didn’t matter how nice your house was,
it didn’t matter what you looked like,
it didn’t matter how nice you were,
nothing mattered,
if you were in the path of the water,
the water was going to overcome you.

House and blocks upon blocks of
entire neighborhoods were completely destroyed.
The water line shows clearly on many houses,
some at four feet, some at six, at eight, up to the roof.
A dark, thick, muddy line –
a stark reminder of nature’s fury and power
with ultimate control.

The houses are now completely abandoned,
house after house. There’s nobody.
The houses are all empty.
The plaster walls have either been knocked down
or they wait to be knocked down
with the mold growing thicker and thicker.

There was such mud and silt,
debris and filth that was left behind.
In one house it was more than a foot deep.
It was disgusting.
It is so sad.

I have no experience to know what it could be like
or what it would be like to lose everything.
However, I saw what it would be like.
I heard people talk about and describe what it is like.
The loss of a home and all its possessions.
The loss of a car.
The loss of your job and even your family members.
The separation, the pain,
the endless anxiety and stress surrounds the people
everywhere they turn.

Amidst the emptiness and the seeming hopelessness,
I ask myself, “Why did I come?”

I came to help. I came to offer hope.
I reminded myself many times throughout our work that
I came with my two hands
and my one heart
and that I would do everything I could to help.

When working on the gutting of the house
it was easy to sing to myself,
“If these old walls could speak.”
The walls do have stories to tell.
The floors have been walked upon.
The doors have been opened and shut.
It would have been easy and a lot less painful for me
to no think about what it used to be like,
or the sounds,
or the words,
or the laughter that used to be.
But it was those things that kept me going.
I want those things for me.
I want the happy family and the comfortable house
and the laughter and the everything else.
Therefore, I want those things for these people.
They deserve the same things.
I am not better. I am no different.
These people are living and loving and doing
what they need to do.
I can help because even the littlest bit of effort
or the smallest help that I can offer is more than
what they have now.
They need so much.
It is not possible in anyway to go through this or
recover from this alone.
The people here need lots of help, assistance, prayers, everything.

So I pray now for the feet that will someday
dance on our floor.
I pray for the carpet and the furniture that will cover it.
I pray for the heart and the spirit that will inhabit this place.
May they find joy and comfort and security and hope.
May a bit of the confidence and feelings of being comfortable that I felt when building rest there
and wait to infiltrate the people.
May I, in a little way, become part of the smiles and the laughter that will someday start again
and hopefully never end.

I pray for their patience.
I pray for their endurance.
I pray that the people maintain a willingness
to keep their eyes and minds,
hearts and efforts focused on the future.

I pray that the people of New Orleans
can be an example of HOPE
for all the rest of the world.

--Sue Monahan
Fair Oaks Presbyterian Church

I expected devastation – I didn’t expect the widespread devastation. The sadness in people’s faces as they told their stories. The cab driver who lost everything, including his mother and mother-in-law. I asked, “How was Mardi Gras?” “That’s when we buried my mother,” he replied. The woman who had just returned to her home totally destroyed said, “I just don’t know what we’ll do.” The mother of a teenager who organized a tennis group while they were living elsewhere, and as she listened to the girls giggling together, she realized it had been weeks since she’d heard her child laugh. The prom dress covered in mud hanging in a home still full of belongings. The incredible story of faith by the woman who was in the Super Dome as a colonel in the National Guard –“They kept coming.” Being told that just
day-to-day living here in New Orleans is stressful. And what about the children? Who head off to camp packing all of their favorite belongings in case another evacuation happens. The fear of June 1 looming – the start of another hurricane season. New Orleans is bruised, scarred, and beaten down, but their spirit is still alive. Habitat and the tireless workers and staff – a monumental undertaking trying to rebuild a neighborhood one house at a time. Bonnie and Jim who kept us fed with fabulous meals and yet are so grateful for the work we did. The Presbyterian Church whose pastor was living in a trailer, whose congregation sent him away for two weeks to be recharged. “Sometimes you need to leave to remember what normal life is like.” The markings on all the houses about food drops, animals found or lost, or checking for survivors. The lunch truck – an Episcopal Church makes and delivers meals six days a week to people out working to rebuild. The new friends made, the laughter and tears shared, all of us being changed forever by what we’ve seen and been a part of.

--Unsigned

I did not expect to have so much fun. I thought I’d suffer a lot. Oh, I did suffer, but just a little. Squeaky mattresses and a bathroom two flights down on the accommodations side, overcoming heat, aches, and tiredness on the work side.

I learned a lot a lot by seeing first-hand what really happened down here in New Orleans and by listening to first-hand reports.

The value of our work is an issue that is becoming clearer to me. I’m not the only one of our group who expressed doubts about developing the area rather than leaving it to nature to become a swamp. But now I’m surer we’ve done a really good thing.

As we made our way across the parking lot to our vans for the final time, I saw a group of people admiring the progress of the development. A woman caught my eye and called out, “Thank you. Thank you so much.
 
I wish God’s blessings on all the future inhabitants of Musician’s Village.

--Linda Cirillo

Nearly a year after Katrina, the neighborhoods of New Orleans remained desolate and I wanted to find signs of life.

Mockingbirds sang from skeletal trees that once shaded neat little homes, now piles of moldering debris. Messages had been sprayed on walls--some defiant (“We shoot looters, have a nice day.”), some plaintive (“Michael, where are you?”). Other signs added color to abandoned, mud-caked cars (“$Cash money for junk cars$”) and silent power-line poles (“We tear down houses” “Tree & Stump Removal”).

Most restaurants seemed either to be closed due to the continuing ravages of mold or to have limited hours due to a lack of qualified staff. I learned to look for open places with State of Louisiana Office of Public Health placards stating they were “Approved for Re-opening Following Hurricane Katrina.”

There were these signs of life, but where were signs of God? Being on the scene of this continuing disaster to help rebuild a few houses, the question of how good people’s lives could be torn apart for no discernable reason gnawed at my heart. It’s easy for others a thousand miles away to know that God is the source of strength when times are bad. But walking amidst these crude signs and being told by a cab driver, “We lost everything” and hearing a waitress say, “Please God, don’t do anything more to us,” those moments tested my spiritual assurance.

I’ve learned over the past few years that mission trips are not simply happy times spent tanning for Jesus. They can be challenging and ultimately soul-strengthening events. In New Orleans, the affirmative signs were subtle but everywhere – in the shiny faces of God that were my fellow Fourth Church travelers (many of whom I did not know before), the persistence of the songbirds, and the resilience of New Orleaneans who still love their home.

For me, the clearest sign of life – the presence of God – came from a local nurse who had been called to Katrina duty in the National Guard. She talked about her assignment to serve the special needs evacuees who streamed into the Super Dome before, during and after the storm. In fact, she became one of the evacuees.

Surrounded by needy people, she was a nurse whose medical supplies consisted of rubber gloves and an unfailing faith strong enough to carry the weakest soul.
“I had faith that God was in control,” she recalled with certainty. “Even those days when I didn’t realize it. He was with me. The Lord carried me through it all.” She didn’t need a sign.

--Joe Pixler