(Colleen and Sean O’Connor traveled with their parents last summer visiting Glenmary missions in Tennessee and Mississippi. What follows is their reflection on working with Brother Joe Steen’s Habitat project in Mississippi.)

Probably the neatest thing about our visit to the Glenmary missions last summer was the day we spent working for Brother Joe Steen at a Habitat for Humanity house that he was helping to build.

Brother Joe teased just about everybody who was working there, but everyone had a good time. He has a red pickup truck where he keeps all the tools, and he hands them out to everybody when they come to work.

We also had the chance to meet Brandon Fowler, who was going to move into the house. He was excited about having a new home. Before, he and his brother and sister and dad lived in an old house trailer. Brandon ran around inside the house, telling us where his room was going to be and where his dad’s room was and the kitchen and everything.

It was pretty hard work. We learned that building a house is not an easy job, but when you have a lot of people to help, the work goes easier.

Brother Joe does this all the time, like just about every weekend, and sometimes during the week.

Another thing we learned from this trip was how friendly everybody was in the South. Everybody was very nice, wherever we went. We met great people in Tennessee and Mississippi, and we met a lot of kids from Mexico who had moved up to the United States for better work and better homes and a chance at a better life. A lot of them spoke English pretty well, too.

One night we had dinner with Brother Joe and Father Steve Pawelk, and they brought out all this good food from their garden and from other friends, and we talked and laughed all night. They didn’t have air-conditioning, but the fans they had kept the room pretty cool anyway.

We also had some really good goetta that Paul Witte made for us in Madisonville, Tenn. Paul’s from Covington, Ky., where they still know how to make goetta!

We think that everybody at Glenmary is great, and we hope we can work on a Habitat House with Brother Joe again sometime, maybe when it’s not so hot! 

Colleen O’Connor, 13, and Sean O’Connor, 11, are students at St. Agnes School in Park Hills, Ky.