TBT: Habemus Papem and Steubenville mission!

Since today marks the one year anniversary of having Pope Francis as our spiritual leader, I decided to do a throwback to what I was doing during the conclave!

I'm sure many of us remember exactly what we were doing when the white smoke appeared. I happened to be spring break and serving the people of Steubenville on a mission trip with many other students from Franciscan. We spent the week divided into groups and tackling whatever needed to be done in the city. This ranged from volunteering at soup kitchens, doing home renovation projects, working at the Samaritan House (a discount thrift store/food pantry run by the TOR Sisters), and even doing some street evangelizing/ prayer ministry. Some of us also attended an ecumenical prayer meeting with different denominations from around the city and simply prayed for one another and for all the poverty and darkness that is present in our beloved Steubenville. It really was a beautiful thing.

Habemus Papem! What was I doing exactly when we heard these words? I was at the Samaritan House doing some office work and helping to clean and reorganize the shelves. We all huddled around the Sisters' computer and watched the live stream. Of course it froze just as Pope Francis was walking out onto the balcony, but it thankfully wasn't stuck for long. It was really awesome to be with Franciscan students and the Sisters when we learned that he chose the name Francis. We all were very excited :)

Here are some photos from that week!

At LAMP, a Catechetical soup kitchen run by the Sisters

We did a scavenger hunt for some team bonding!

We got up really early one morning and prayed over the city. Awesome.

At a home renovation site 

The whole motley crew! Loved my team 

Hanging out with kids from Tower of Power church. So fun!

I have so many more pictures on the FB, but these are just a few. It was truly an amazing week. Not only did I fall in love with Steubenville, but my team members continually inspired and taught me so much. We had such a great group of guys on our team who got up early one morning and woke us women up by playing guitar and made and served us breakfast!

If you want to learn more about the city and the amazing work still going on, check out the Harmonium Project. They are awesome. 

Happy Thursday :)