Newsroom Archive

Redeemer Youth Group Returns from Mission Trip to Biloxi Building on the Bayou

Sarasota, FL / 05 July, 2006 – High school youth from the Church of the Redeemer in Sarasota recently returned from a week-long Senior High Mission Trip to Biloxi, Mississippi. The purpose of the mission effort, called “Building on the Bayou,” was to perform much-needed site-clean up at buildings and homes devastated by Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

Between June 4 and 9, fifteen youth from Redeemer worked on several sites in and around Biloxi, doing demolition, painting, general site clean up and removal of waste. They were housed at Bethel Lutheran Church in Biloxi, which has been serving as a Katrina Relief Shelter, providing housing and meals for up to one hundred hurricane volunteers every day. Bethel also functions as a free medical clinic during the week for hundreds of hurricane victims.

In addition to their site work, while at Bethel Lutheran, the Redeemer young people assisted in the preparation and serving of meals for other hurricane volunteers, as well as taking care of kitchen-clean up after each meal.

The group also devoted considerable time at the former site of their “sister church” – the Episcopal Church of the Redeemer in Biloxi, which was tragically completely swept away by Hurricane Katrina. The Church of the Redeemer in Sarasota was, in fact, named after the Redeemer Biloxi, and the congregations have exchanged visits in the past.

According to Adelaide Boedecker, 17, and a soon-to-be senior at Pine View School, the mission trip was “a life changing experience.”

“We saw all of the destruction and all of the pain that these people [in Biloxi] went through,” Boedecker said. “We helped a lot of people, but you can see that they still need so much more help …” she added.

The Reverend Richard Marsden, a priest at the Church of the Redeemer in Sarasota, was one of the chaperones for the mission trip. While sifting through debris on the Biloxi Redeemer church site, according to Marsden, one of the adult chaperones spotted a plaque dedicating a pew to Jefferson Davis, the former president of the Confederacy who settled in the area and was a member of the parish following the Civil War. The mission group was very happy to be able to return the plaque intact to the members of the Biloxi parish.

The youth also collected hundreds of shards of stained glass from the original church windows. They gave the stained glass remnants to the Biloxi church which may use them in a commemorative stained glass window when their new church is constructed.

Boedecker described the mission trip as having a great impact on all of the Redeemer Youth. “It was amazing for us to see the devastation firsthand,” she said.

“But the greatest impact,” Boedecker added, “was for all of us to see that in the face of losing so much, these folks still have hope.”

While working on the site of one Biloxi family’s home, now just a frame with no walls, the youth recovered paintings, a couch, even the daughter’s senior photo album, all of which had been swept away by the hurricane storm surge into the nearby woods, according to Boedecker. The youth collected the items and returned them to the family, who, in return, made homemade deep-fried potato chips for the youth as a way of thanking them.

The Senior High Youth who participated in the “Building on the Bayou” mission trip include: Patrick Brown, Priscilla Brown, Erin Berg, Adelaide Boedecker, Grier Ferguson, David Pascal-Black, Christoph Stephenson-Moe, Davis Dunlap, William Crouse, James Montgomery, Caitlyn Turner, Lizzy Lewis, Clifton Lewis, Anise Veldkamp, Matt Mercurio.

The Mission Trip was led by Scott Merritt, Redeemer’s Youth Minister, and adult chaperones included Father Richard Marsden, Liz Berg, Jacki Boedecker, Laura Crouse, Jay Crouse, and Tony Veldkamp.

Each morning before beginning the day’s work, adult chaperones would lead morning devotion for the group. At their mid-day lunch breaks they led an informal Bible study and held evening devotions as well. The group attended services at Bethel Lutheran one evening, and Father Marsden also held a special Eucharist amidst the ruins of what once was the Church of the Redeemer, Biloxi.

In 2005, after Hurricane Katrina, the Church of the Redeemer in Sarasota collected and donated close to $62,000 to the Episcopal Dioceses of Mississippi and Louisiana for hurricane relief efforts in those areas. Additionally, knowing of the loss of everything at Redeemer, Biloxi, the church school classes of Redeemer, Sarasota, collected materials to completely restock their Sunday School supplies, gathering everything from paper, pencils and markers to costumes for their Christmas and Easter pageants.

For more information about youth activities at the Church of the Redeemer, call 955.4263. The Church of the Redeemer is located at 222 South Palm Avenue, in downtown Sarasota.