Campus Ministry helps students practice faith and BCCares gives volunteer opportunities

By JAMIE MCCLURE, Globe Intern
August 30, 2007

Students heading off to college for the first time may experience fear of losing their faith.

They are overwhelmed with classes, trying to make friends and the difficult decision of what to do with the rest of their lives continues to creep into their mind.

Campus Ministry at Briar Cliff University offers opportunities to help students experiencing this fear to keep their faith.

"We provide opportunity, activities, retreats, etc. in order to get students involved in their faith," said Sister Janet May, director of Campus Ministry. "We don't force students or lay guilt trips on them, but we try to encourage, invite and provide for them."

The two-person Campus Ministry team is focused on the spiritual life of the students and they look for ways to incorporate faith and action into their lives. They also try to build a Christian community for the students while assisting them in making good lifestyle choices.

"When students come to college, they need to start choosing faith for themselves and their parents can't make that decision for them," said Sister May. "We give them the opportunity to do that, and they do what they want with it."

Some of the opportunities Briar Cliff offers include:

*Bible study / faith sharing

*Prayer experiences

*Special liturgies

*Catholic Daughters of America

*Knights of Columbus

*RCIA (Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults)

*Retreats

*Service opportunities (Peace and Justice Committee, BCCares opportunities and mission trips)

Campus Ministry sponsors two mission trips during the school year. The first trip is to Honduras from Nov. 15-23 and the next trip is to Mississippi from Feb. 21-29. Only 20 students can go on the mission trips and this year there will be a huge waiting list.

"The students love the missions trips," said Sister May.

"During the first couple weeks of school, we try to hand out lists of ways that incoming students can be involved in Campus Ministry," said Sister. "Our goal is make connections with them and find out where they are in their faith. We also try to get them engaged as early as possible but some students are overwhelmed first term."

Sister May also said Campus Ministry tries to move around the cafeteria to invite first year students to the various activities. This way they get to know them and they don't slip through the cracks.

"We try to get students comfortable to talk about what they need and what they are struggling with," said May. "We are here to listen to them; not just about their faith but about everything in their lives."

The Resident Assistants who live on each floor of the dorms are there to help students, and according to Sister May, Campus Ministry relies on them to observe the students and make sure they don't isolate themselves.

"We only have a two-person staff besides our four work study students," said Sister May. "We can't know everything. So, we need anyone who notices a change in someone to contact us. We want to help."

Along with Campus Ministry, there is a community service learning opportunity on campus called BCCares. This program is a branch of Campus Ministry and is run by the Assistant Campus Minister, Mark Westrich. He has been at Briar Cliff for one year.

There are three major activities for which students may volunteer throughout the year and those include a Senior Citizen's Day Out Luncheon, a Christmas party for community residents with mental and physical disabilities and also an Easter party for children of faculty, staff and the community.

During welcome week for new students, BCCares conducted a food drive on Aug. 27 for the Food Bank of Siouxland. Freshman students went around to the community surrounding the campus and picked up donated food.

"Our goal was to have the food drive this year to get a feel for it and see what works and what doesn't," said Westrich. "We had 160 freshman students sign up for the drive, but we ended up having around 200 students show up to help."

Students didn't know a lot about BCCares during the beginning of Westrich's first year at Briar Cliff. With that in mind, students didn't utilize the one-on-one contact that is also a part of the program. Once the end of the year came around, at least six students were talking to Westrich a day.

"Considering everything we do is optional, the most encouraging thing to me is to see the turnout of students at the activities that we offer," said Westrich. "We want to send out all of God's love that we have in our hearts to the community that we work with."

These programs are open to students of all faiths. For more information, contact Campus Ministry at (712) 279-5227 and BCCares at (712) 279-5485.