Church of the Brethren Newsline
September 19, 2018
Two Brethren Volunteer Service (BVS) units held orientation over the summer and have begun their service at project locations across the country and around the world.
BVS Unit 319, among the larger recent units, met at Camp Colorado (Sedalia, Colo.) from late July to early August. Volunteers and their placements are: Julia Bambauer of Trier, Germany and Judith Blaik of Bingen, Germany are serving with Good Samaritan Services in Ephrata, Pa.; Donthia Browne of Freetown, Sierra Leone, is serving with Project PLASE in Baltimore, Md.; Lauren Capasso of Bridgewater (Va.) Church of the Brethren is serving with Casa de Esperanza de los Ninos in Houston, Texas; Kathy Edmark and Roger Edmark of Olympic View Community Church of the Brethren in Seattle will be serving at World Friendship Center, Hiroshima, Japan, starting in summer 2019.
Elly Green of Louisville, Ky., is serving with the Corrymeela Community in Ballycastle, Northern Ireland; Lukas Kuhn of Brackenheim, Germany, is serving with Highland Park Elementary School in Roanoke, Va.; Pauline Liu of Parker, Colo., serving with L’Arche Kilkenny in the Republic of Ireland. Lisa-Maire Mayerle of Hoechstaedt, Germany, is serving with the Hagerstown Church of the Brethren and Shepherd’s Spring Outdoor MinistryCenter in Maryland; Monica McFadden of Highland Avenue Church of the Brethren (Elgin, Ill.) is serving with the Church of the Brethren Office of Peacebuilding and Policy, Washington, D.C.
Caitlin O’Quinn of Gary, Ind., is serving with the Asian Rural Institute in Japan; Alex Parker of Community Church of the Brethren (Hutchinson, Kan.) is serving with Quaker Cottage in Belfast, Northern Ireland; Holden Stehle of Greensboro, Md., is serving with ABODE Services, Fremont, Calif.; Judy Stout of San Diego (Calif.) Church of the Brethren California is serving with Ekklesiyar Yan’uwa a Nigeria (Church of the Brethren in Nigeria); and Ben Zaspel of Offenburg, Germany, is serving with SnowCap Community Charities in Portland, Ore.
BVS/Brethren Revival Fellowship (BRF) Unit 320 met at Camp Swatara (Bethel, Pa.) in August. Volunteers and their placements are:
Emily Kline of White Oak Church of the Brethren (Manheim, Pa.) and Carson Ocker of Upton Church of the Brethren (Greencastle, Pa.) are serving with The Root Cellar in Lewiston, Maine; Jolene and Sheldon Shank from the Heidelberg Church of the Brethren (Newmanstown, Pa.) are serving as house parents for the BRF unit and living in Lewiston, Maine, along with their children, Cameron, Megan, Ryan, Courtney, Sara, Breanne, Autumn, and Judah. In addition to serving as a house parent, Sheldon Shank is also serving with The Root Cellar.
BVS Unit 321 will hold orientation Sept. 30-Oct. 19 at CampPine Lake, Eldora, Iowa. For more information about Brethren Volunteer Service visit www.brethren.org/BVS.
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