It has been seven months since Hurricane Harvey has struck the state of Texas last fall. It is considered one of the biggest hurricane disasters in recent years. Many lives have been affected by this hurricane. In light of this, the Christian Campus Fellowship for Vincennes University partnered with Helping His Hands Disasters Response organization to travel down to Texas for a mission trip during Spring Break.

Helping His Hands is an disaster response organization that is stationed in Vincennes, Indiana, and are well known for responding to many disasters and doing community services. They have partnered with CCF to help many families that had taken a toll from the hurricane. Many students have volunteered to travel to Texas to help out as much as they can. They also have done flood reliefs for three different homes that were flooded and started to rebuild those homes.

Preston Ratliff, campus minister, said that the part of the trip that most influenced him was “to see the students have their eyes opening up to what was going on down there and having the opportunity to serve […] a lot of them can’t wait to go on another trip like that.”

Ratliff considers his and many other students’ experiences to be “eye-opening.” He believes that students should be more involved with community services that will help people in need.

“It enables them to, you might say, step out of their comfort zone,” said Zach Johnson, Borden, homeland security and religious studies.

CCF is looking to do more mission trips like this in the near future. They are also open for new members to students who are interested in joining. For more info about CCF, you can contact Ratliff at 812-882-1261 or at [email protected]​.