Since Father Neil Bakker came to St. John the Baptist Catholic Church in 2018, he’s made it a priority to give parish youth the opportunity to serve a community in need and broaden their global perspective.

That effort is coming to fruition this month, as eight local high school students embark on a mission trip to Ghana.

Bakker first visited the African country in 2017, while working at Our Lady of Grace Catholic Church in Edina.

Through the Our Lady Grace’s decades-long connection with St. Joseph’s parish in Ghana, and the help of donations from parishioners, they were able to build a school for St. Joseph’s.

“So far they’ve spent $14 million building this huge school over there,” Bakker said. “It houses almost 900 kids. It’s very western and very advanced.”

When Bakker came to St. John’s he wanted to develop a similar relationship with a parish in that corner of the world. St. John’s annual mission trip seemed like a good place to start, but despite Bakker’s connections with St.

Joseph’s parish, the prospect of taking students on a trans-Atlantic mission trip felt far-fetched at first.

READ ALSO:

Pope Francis Announces New Bishops For USA, Nigeria, Republic Of Congo

“We weren’t sure if we’d be able to pull it off but we slowly started moving in that direction and raised money — our kids really worked their tails off,” Bakker said.

The students fundraised by bagging groceries, hosting concerts, serving food at Pizza Ranch and selling frozen pizzas.

Bakker said through these fundraising exercises, each kid was able to raise the necessary travel expenses — $2,500 each.

This will be the first time St. John’s takes students on a mission trip of this scope.

Eight students and seven chaperones will spend eight days in Ghana, most of which in Mamponteng, a suburb Kumasi — a major city in the country’s southern region. One student, Mikayla Lopez, said the trip offers a fresh way to tap into her faith.

“Everyone can live out their faith in daily life — going to church, praying, doing small acts of kindness, etc — this is such a unique opportunity to practice my faith in a whole new setting,” Lopez said.

On the way to Mamponteng they will visit a castle on the Cape Coast that played an integral part in the slave trade.

Slaves sold at the castle were shipped to the Caribbean and the Americas.

“It’s very visceral, very striking to be in that place,” Bakker said. “They really walk you through it and what it was like for them.”

In Mamponteng they will interact with high school and elementary kids, playing sports and completing a service project.

“I certainly hope they have the experience I did my first time there, of encountering people who are living so differently than we are,”

Bakker said. “To go over there and see people living in a different way but still having a deep joy in life and having poverty — a lot of times they have a better attitude than we do.”

Bakker said another purpose of the trip is to develop a sister parish relationship with a satellite parish of St. Joseph’s.

“The Gospel commands us to be charitable and outwardly focused,” Bakker said. “Compassion means to have ‘co-passion,’ to take on another person’s passion — their needs, their wants and their struggles. This is an outlet for that.”

Bakker recalled a memory on his first trip to Ghana, when a high-schooler thanked him for simply visiting the country and showing support.

“She said, ‘It really tells us that we matter, that you’re willing to come this far,’” Bakker said. “It’s so good for them to know that they’re wanted by someone, especially in a big developed country.”

swnewsmedia