CTK students reach out to Cristo Rey for Lent project

The hallways of Cristo Rey Baton Rouge Franciscan High School are decked with pennants from colleges all around the United States where students have been accepted, along with various other student achievements and positive messages. It speaks of dreams realized and dreams in the making by the Wolfpack. On March 24 students from Christ the King Church and Catholic Center at LSU provided Cristo Rey students with goodie bags filled with physical and motivational food for their journey as part of a Lent service project.

Cristo Rey educates students of limited economic means to become successful faith-filled leaders. The school combines a college preparatory education with a corporate work study program. Last year’s inaugural graduation celebrated success for the students and school in the midst of many challenges. CTK exchanged high fives and bumped elbows with the high schoolers during the distribution to say, “keep going” and “we believe in you.”

Amelia Gallagher, CTK campus minister, said with COVID-19 presenting such difficulties, the Lord put it on her heart that making goodie bags would be something that would bring a message of encouragement to the Cristo Rey students. 

“What Cristo Rey does is awesome, and this is something we can do to help,” said Gallagher.

The students assembled about 165 goodie bags filled with such things as snacks, notebooks and inspirational items personalized to each student and to show them that the Lord loves them and cares about them, according to Gallagher.

“I really enjoyed the school supplies given to us. The tablet in particular I am using it in my classes now,” said Cristo Rey freshman Coleman Dupree.

She said CTK parishioners responded generously when asked to contribute items for the goodie bags. 
 

Courtney Hahn, a freshman and member of the LSU cheerleading squad, comes from Ohio and said she is happy to bring a spark of hope to the Cristo Rey students.

“I’m very blessed that no matter how far I am away from home, I can be a light for others,” said Hahn, noting the project had touched her soul as well.

“Through this experience I’ve been led close to Jesus by the Holy Spirit,” Hahn said.   

Sophomore Will Clark said he was struggling at the beginning of last semester when he joined the CTK service team and a small Scripture study group whose inspiration is Pier Giorgio Frassati.

He was particularly impacted by an opportunity to serve after Hurricane Laura devastated the Lake Charles area in August.

“Sometimes we worked side by side with the families we were helping,” said Clark.

He said his time there taught him a lot about “living in the world of reality” and how the smallest acts of love are important.
Senior Guy Cresson said the opportunity to give words of affirmation, to see the joy on the students’ faces and know they had made their day made his own Lenten journey more meaningful.

After the “goodie bag encounter,” some Cristo Rey students are eyeing the possiblilty of attending LSU.

“Thank you for the LSU team taking the time to come out here, and deliver the goodies to us. I felt very loved and appreciated,” said freshman R’Corious Lavergne, “It also makes me excited to join the CTK team because I want to go to college at LSU.”

Freshman Seth Fields agreed.

“I was a really nice thing for them to do, LSU is now on my radar for college in the future.”