By Elliot Guerra, Coordinator of Youth Ministry, Our Lady of Mount Carmel Church, Tenafly, New Jersey This world is rotten to the core,” she said. “Like a big ‘ol melon you left in yo’ crisper too long, and when God picks it up, His thumb is gonna go right through it.” It was August 2008 and I was in the Crescent City with Catholic Charities’ Operation Helping Hands (OHH), gutting and rebuilding homes post-Katrina. In the South it always seems easier to talk. At the local Waffle House: “Son, you in God’s country now, whatcha wanna know, that you can’t tell by lookin’ out ‘da winda.” In a gas station: “There used to be this funny sign painted on that wall.” He pointed to a storefront with the watermark stained at the highest point of at least eight feet off the ground. “It was this ol’ sign that said ‘Breakfast. Lunch. Cigarettes.’ Folks not from these parts would find that funny, but to us ‘Nawlins folks it was just a sign, now washed away. *** Every morning in prayer I ask God to break my heart. In ministry we often have to be reminded of the Christ-like passion that got us into ministry in the first place. We never want to be used to seeing the poor, never want to assume their pain is a tired, old task for us to complete, as if it were some great favor. It is a very Carmelite ideal, to ask God to continually renew your zealousness for the Lord (one immediately thinks of the Order’s motto). In prayer during my first August
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