Memories from Appalachia and Seeing God

by Kaitlyn Willy
Chaplain's Apprentice

Looking out my bedroom window and seeing snow all over the place, working from home because the road still has snow on it and the white flakes continue to fall en masse from the sky, it’s hard to believe that last week (really, I guess two weeks ago) was Spring Break or that this Sunday is Easter.

We’ve been on a bit of a hiatus here at the BCC Blog because, frankly, everyone is busy at this time in the semester. It’s the time of the semester when the reality of finals, only five weeks away now, hits and everyone is scrambling around trying to get the work done that they have been slacking on since before Spring Break. I remember that time in college vividly. It was when I stopped eating real food, stopped sleeping more than a couple hours a night, and lived off only tea and midnight runs to Whataburger (which hardly constitutes as real food) with my friends who, wanting to escape the pressures of papers, exams, theses, and work, called me and begged for a ride, for a break, for quality time with someone other than Socrates or Augustine… or, during my last semester, Evelyn Waugh.

I’ve been thinking about my own college days a lot lately. There are a lot of reasons—missing friends, seeing their statuses on facebook talking about their own new lives, feeling far away from home—but I think the main reason is that while the rest of you were at home resting, hanging out on a beach somewhere, attending a show on Broadway in New York, or whatever you were doing over Spring Break, I took a group of 8 amazing Butler students to Nazareth Farm, which is the sister farm of Bethlehem Farm, where I first really felt my call to ministry.

As a college junior (I was a bit of a pain in the neck, to be honest), I arrived in West Virginia not knowing why I was there, what I was going to do (other than farm, which was something I did know how to do), or who I was going to meet. Like many of the most important events in my life, I had chosen to go on the University of Dallas’ Alternative Spring Break program without having a clear idea of why. I just ended up going. I worked for campus ministry (is anyone surprised?) and was friends with the graduate student Campus Minister who was leading the trip. He had been talking about it a lot, I didn’t have money to do anything else (at UD, campus ministry had the ability to fund the trip completely because we had an awesome church on campus with parishioners who gave generous donations and supported our many fund raisers), and it just felt right. It was a big commitment, we had meetings almost every week leading up to the trip and it was a struggle to fit everything in.

Finally, after a great deal of preparation and shopping around for work boots, a rain jacket, and all the other things I would need for this week of lots of work and no showering, I climbed into the 12 passenger van that we would be in for almost two days before getting to West Virginia (friends, Dallas is a LOT farther from WV than Indianapolis is). After listening to John Denver’s “Country Roads” several times (which is actually about the Western part of VA, not WV), we drove down a long road on the side of a mountain and then up a (seemingly) longer driveway and finally saw a sign that read “welcome home.” I got out of the van (which by that point, we lovingly called the “vomit comet” after one of my friends got sick only a couple hours into the trip) and was attacked by a whole bunch of people giving me hugs.

Now, twenty-one year old Kaitlyn differed from twenty-four year old Kaitlyn in many ways, and one of them was that I honestly hated hugs, except for from about 10 select people, four of whom were my parents and my two dogs (seriously). So, yeah, I had been at the farm for about two seconds and I was already totally out of my comfort zone. Fortunately, things got better (but also more intense) pretty quick.

Over the next five days, God took the opportunity to mold and shape me but also to remind me of who I was. I had lost a lot of myself in going to college because UD (while a great place that I love) was the sort of place that made you change yourself to fit in. Very few people enjoyed being themselves there, and they were usually disliked by the majority of students on campus. The Catholic University for Independent Thinkers was , ironically, never that big on individuality. I was the only farm girl in my group of city kids and, needing to fit into their world, I had lost a lot of my own culture. At this point in my college career, only four of my friends had ever heard me speaking in my accent, and then only because they had gone home with me or had been around me when I was so tired I couldn’t control it. So when I found myself at Bethlehem Farm, surrounded by people who reminded me more of home than anything else, it was a bit of a shock. While my friends struggled with a totally new culture, I struggled with my own identity and fought back memories from childhood and tears.

The farm house reminded me of my grandmother’s house, an elderly man whose house I worked on reminded me of my uncle and my dad, while his wife reminded me of my grandmother. They spoke with the same accent that I had grown up with in the Ozarks and they lived a lifestyle that reminded me of the people I had known from childhood. On community night, when members of the community came over for dinner, a couple older men brought banjos and guitars and I sat and listened, remembering the many, many nights of sitting and listening to my grandfather play the same instruments. When we went to a local protestant church for their worship service, while my friends were complaining about how weird the gospel music was or how uncomfortable it was to be in a protestant church, I was having flashbacks to my cousins’ gospel quartet and listening to them play at their church when I was younger. These people sang the same songs and, to my friends’ surprise, I found myself singing along.

All in all, the trip to Bethlehem Farm helped me to remember who I was in the midst of both the identity crisis that was college and the haze that celiac’s was causing— the damage that disease was wreaking on my body and soul. My time at Beth Farm is probably the clearest memory from the entire of my junior year, and I imagine it’s partly because even though I was still eating gluten, I was eating a lot of natural food without preservatives. My time at Bethlehem Farm also shaped me as I was introduced to new knowledge about the earth and the environment and when I got back to UD, the immediate impression of my roommate and best friend, Rebecca, was that I was becoming even more of a hippie than I was before, something she found amusing as long as it didn’t affect her directly (which, in the long run, it definitely did).

In the four years since, I have not returned to Bethlehem Farm, but I have been to Nazareth Farm twice and each time I have been reminded of the huge importance that first trip played in my life. It is probably true that I wouldn’t have ended up in Echo or working at Butler, had it not been for that trip and the influence it had on me. But I would also just simply not be me. And in each trip to Nazareth Farm, I have found more of myself hiding in the deep and dark corners of my soul, dying to get out and see the sun. And those little bits have found freedom there, in a place so drastically different from my everyday life and yet, not so different, and perhaps more like home than anything else I have experienced.

This year’s trip to Naz Farm was no exception. While the snow fell down on us, making our work harder (because snow mixed with warm soil creates mud, and mud makes dirty work like underpinning a trailer even dirtier), and while my girls shivered out in the barn and later moved into the common room because the heater in the barn was broken, I was being reminded of who I am, what is important to me, and what I believe. God was challenging me, reminding me of where I have failed, but also consoling me, inviting me into deeper communion with him. As any of the eight students who went with me can attest, it was a busy week, packed with a lot of events, a lot of emotion, and a lot of God. There are so many stories I could tell you (like about the Mountain Justice seminar we went to or about how I accidentally glutenized myself and how very unpleasant I can be when I’m sick), but I’ve already taken up a lot of your time and so, I would like to share just one story with you, about the Eucharist.

At Nazareth Farm, as I’m sure you would expect from any Catholic organization, we have a couple opportunities for a Eucharistic Celebration (Communion Service). Of course, my celiac’s prevents me from being able to consume a normal consecrated host and so, because we had no priest or gluten free hosts available, I was unable to receive. Before our Communion Service at the beginning of the week, I had spoken with a staff member who I am friends with and had been reminded of Mother Theresa saying that the Christ in the Tabernacle is the same as the Christ on the street. Typically, I find communion services or Masses where I cannot receive to be a little frustrating, as the Eucharist is my very favorite part of being Catholic. This time was different. Sitting there, watching the other volunteers receive the Eucharist, I had an overwhelming feeling of consolation and I truly felt Christ’s presence in the others. It was a beautiful gift from the Holy Spirit, and I know that having this experience so early in the week shaped my experience of God through the rest of the week and continues to do so.



As we go into Holy Week, I think we all need to remember Christ’s true presence in our lives though others, through the Eucharist, and in so many other ways. I encourage you to remember to celebrate this Holy Week, even though the snow, studies, and homework have you pretty busy now. And don’t forget, the BCC will be having Easter Sunday Mass at 11 followed by Brunch in Robertson Hall. Please rsvp to me (kwilly@butler.ed) if you’re coming and let me know if you’re bringing guests.

And next year, consider going to Nazareth Farm. Every student who went this year said it was an amazing experience and many want to go again. Check out the Naz Farm pictures on facebook and keep us in mind next year!

Peace,

Kaitlyn