FaithX concludes 2024 service trips

By Marissa Witkovsky-Eldred

In 2024, a total of 183 youth and adults joined FaithX service trips and had the opportunity to engage in service, learn new skills, grow in faith, explore interesting places, live in community, and build friendships. Junior high, senior high, and older adult participants served at 10 locations in the United States, while adult participants traveled to Ecuador.

Highlights of our 2024 FaithX trips:

— More than 30 youth and adult participants from 6 different churches joining together for service at Camp Mardela–our biggest FaithX trip of the summer!

— Visits to Juniata College and Elizabethtown College with senior high participants during a custom FaithX trip.

— Older adult FaithXers sharing stories of their lives and singing hymns in four-part harmony during devotions at Camp Ithiel.

— Partnering for a third summer with SPARK for a week of immersive service learning, which included living alongside currently or formerly unhoused individuals and two non-Brethren youth groups.

— Adult FaithX participants age 21 to 81 sharing in farm and garden tasks at Fundación Brethren y Unida in Ecuador, using many hands to make light work of projects that typically take the small FBU staff multiple days to complete.

The enthusiasm and dedication of our FaithX participants is amazing to witness. They are full of such love and a willingness to serve! If you would like to see photos from the 2024 FaithX trips, check them out at www.yogile.com/faithx-2024.

We cannot wait to see what next year holds. Dates and locations for our 2025 FaithX service trips will be announced soon. We hope you will join us!

Find out more about FaithX at www.brethren.org/faithx.

— Marissa Witkovsky-Eldred is coordinator of Short-Term Service for the Church of the Brethren, working the Brethren Volunteer Service office.