Summer Missions

Jesuit High School students are off to a great start in their summer of service. With two service immersion mission trips in early June, some 35 Jesuit students already have made a big impact in the lives of others.

From May 31 – June 7, a Jesuit contingent of 29, including 26 students and three chaperones, traveled to Belle Glade, a rural Everglades community, and invested themselves in assisting the local parish, St. Philip Benizi, and the people of the community.

For years, the Jesuit service club Agmen Christi and other student groups at the school have served in Belle Glade along the shores of Lake Okeechobee. This time, the 26 students cleaned up the grounds of the church, did heavy landscaping, woodwork, pressure washing, trench work, painting – whatever needed to be done – while participating in the parish community, celebrating Mass, and playing a little stickball in the evenings.

The 'Men for Others' who uplifted Belle Glade last week were students Wyatt Allender, Kellis Braddock, Tyler Cappy, Troy Cura, Christian Diaz, Braxton Dolitsky, Benjamin Fultz, Trip Henry, William Higgins, Michael Ibrahim, Charles Iler, Richard Jones, Tate Kiser, Luke Martinez-Monfort, Jace Martino, Gavin McMillon, Cooper Moran, GianLuca Pasquotto, Nathaniel Shehata, Luke Shehata, Kevin Stinnett, Andrew Valone, Whit Waechter, Graham Wills, Luke Wills, and Benjamin Wuthrick, along with chaperones Erick Alvarez-Gil, Ben Rodenbaugh, and Joe Madigan.

The annual South Dakota service immersion mission trip is happening this week (departure on June 7 and return June 14). Nine rising seniors, along with chaperones Andy Wood ’92 and Henry Ibanez ’86, enjoyed a weekend of sightseeing, including Mount Rushmore and the Badlands region, before beginning a week of operating a Vacation Bible School on the Rosebud Indian Reservation for the Lakota children, as part of the St. Francis Mission on the reservation (sfmission.org). In the evenings they are doing manual labor, such as painting, garden work ,and cemetery clean-up and repairs, on the reservation.

The nine rising seniors serving the Lakota children and the St. Francis Mission are: Rocco Falcon, Julian Forrester, Caden Franz, Gabriel Garcia, Anthony Odio, Jesse Planz, Max Purvis, Davis Swiger, and Will Thomas.

This week, the annual pilgrimage to Europe is departing. A contingent of 73 students and 19 chaperones will participate in the two-week Jubilee Pilgrimage to Barcelona, Rome, Vienna, and finishing in Gaming, in the foothills of the majestic Austrian Alps.

In July, a contingent of Jesuit students, led by chaperones Nayvi Hernandez and Mr. Giovanni Diaz, S.J., will once again travel to Guatemala to serve the Valley of the Angels orphanage.

For many more photos of the Jesuit students service experiences this month in Belle Glade and South Dakota, go to the Facebook page Jesuit High School of Tampa. Also, the South Dakota mission trip and the upcoming European Pilgrimage and Guatemala mission trips all can be followed on Instagram, @tigerpilgrims.

The first four images below are from the Belle Glade mission, the final three are from South Dakota.