Mission Accomplished.

1900 miles later; 80 youth exhausted from painting, gardening, and other service jobs in northern New Jersey; and all of Manhattan toured in about eight hours; I think I can truly say mission accomplished.

For the last week I was on a service-mission trip with the youth of Holy Cross parish in Kaukauna, where I am stationed this summer, and the youth of the neighboring parish, Holy Spirit parish in Darboy-Kimberly. With a day to recover, I can say I am still exhausted. Those coach-buses just do not provide the kind of sleep that a seminarian needs.

All told though it was a good experience, and I hope that in the few short years when I will be starting in parish ministry as a priest that I am able to bring youth on these service-mission trips.

After all -- true Christian service is one of the strongest vehicles of evangelization. We see this from the Gospel ("What ever you have done to the least of my brethren...") in the early Church (many of the governors of the provinces of the Roman empire were resistant to following the edicts commanding presecution of Christians, because of the great services they rendered to society at large), and we are even reminded of this in the first encyclical of the great pontiff, Benedict XVI, Deus Caritas Est.