A large portion of the Christendom College student body recently sacrificed their spring breaks to spend time serving the poor on four different mission trips, the College reported.

Students fundraised the expenses for mission trips to Guatemala, Jamaica, Peru, and Bronx, New York. The 19 percent of the student body participating in the trips was also joined by Christendom faculty and staff members.

"The mission trip bore great fruit in active charity for the needy, in personal growth in grace, in fraternal charity among the missionaries, and in awareness of poverty in developing nations," said Christendom Chaplin Fr. Donald Planty, who led the trip to Guatemala.

The group in Guatemala worked with the Missionary Sisters of the Poor Jesus at a hospital for malnourished children and visited their families.

In Jamaica, the students were accompanied by college alumnus Fr. Joseph Mary Brown of the Community of St. John. The group collaborated with the Missionaries of the Poor in the city of Kingston.

"It was an experience I will never forget," said Senior Emi Funai, who joined thirteen other classmates in Peru working with the Missionary Servants of the Poor of the Third World at a school for young women and a house for abandoned and disabled children.

The students who traveled to the Bronx helped the Franciscan Friars of the Renewal at their homeless shelter for men. The students painted, cleaned and delivered food and clothing to the homeless living on the streets.

Senior Lisa Hill said of the trip, "We were able to recognize the dignity of these suffering people and that beyond food and clothing, what these homeless men and women needed was to be loved."

Christendom College is recommended by The Cardinal Newman Society at TheNewmanGuide.com for its strong Catholic identity.

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