After serving a semester at Northern Michigan University, I’m now graduated and on mission at East Tennessee State University in the incredible Johnson City, Tennessee!! I’m just beginning to understand what a real gift it is to serve here at ETSU. There are SO MANY people on campus who I get to meet and fearlessly share the gospel with. Well, alongside my teammates I’m able to meet them and invite them to know the real Christ Jesus personally.

My entire life I’ve loved adventure. Growing up I wanted to be a jungle explorer (or a teacher… I still go back and forth about that)! My faith was fostered in a Catholic parish with lots of exciting opportunities for young people to encounter Christ, I even spent time with Jesus in Eucharistic Adoration weekly. And each time I went to an event I felt a massive rush of happiness, that kind of “Jesus high”. Yet, I was always waiting for the next event or experience to refill my fleeting happiness.

At NMU in the fall of 2020, I showed up to our Catholic Campus Ministry ready to find that same happiness in college! But, I struggled during freshman year amidst a lot of change, a dorm room constantly full of fruit flies, and some difficult friendships, meanwhile everything I’d been expecting from the faith just didn’t satisfy. I was lonely, anxious, uncomfortable, and I threw my hopes for God away in exchange for counterfeit happiness elsewhere. When I’d hit the lowest point though, the Lord put some FOCUS missionaries in my way.

Over the next 3 years they continually showed me how to live for Christ whether life was comfortable or really hard. They invited me to go to a conference with about 22,000 Catholic college students in St. Louis and it was there that my heart was convicted of mission.

There in adoration I spoke to God about how scared I truly was to let him have control of my life. I couldn’t let him into my heart because it was full of undying shame and I had a feeling like I wasn’t good enough to do his work. I told him, “Lord, it would be so much easier, and I could reach so many more people for you if I didn’t have all these difficulties in my life. Just take away every discomfort.” In that moment I heard him speak back to me the words of Pope Benedict XVI, “You weren’t made for comfort. You were made for greatness”.

He assured me that there are men out there who he has set in my path; people who need me exactly as I am, with all of my flaws, fears, and failures so that they can come to know Jesus. I go out on mission knowing that this isn’t just another adventure for me, but rather that Christ himself has called me to serve his people, to enter into the darkness as a light, radiating His love to all. Everyone deserves to know they are perfectly and personally loved by God. And WE can share that with them together.

As a missionary, I get to be a light of Christ’s love in the darkness that many college students don’t even know they’re in. To do this though, I need a team of people like you who are willing to be a missionary with me in your own way. By supporting my mission you are taking an active role in sharing Christ’s love on campus alongside me.

I have taken the responsibility to raise all of the funds required for my mission and I also deeply rely on your prayers to be able to enter into students’ lives and meet them where they’re at – both physically and spiritually. If you are interested in supporting me, please reach out to me. I’d love to hear your story and share more of mine! I would be honored to share this mission with you!

Please email, call, or text me at [email protected] or (269) 438-1443.