Service Work In The Community

Service work strengthens a sense of community. Teamwork is dedicating yourself to common goal with other people so by getting a group of buddies to perform service work in Brooklyn neighborhood helps those friends bond thus strengthening the CUA community at large while showing our neighbors over the bridge that we care about them as well as our community. Although you should be concerned for the whole of humanity, the local neighborhood is easier for most people to understand in its immediate importance. The benefit is obvious when a neighborhood is cleaned up or a playground is installed. The families with little children who attended the Halloween on campus event in October saw that this school is not only interested in educating its students but in being an asset to the Brooklyn community. The wonderful elderly in the Little Sisters of the Poor home just across Harewood Road saw that the Catholic students care and can spend time with them. One of the leaders of the Washington Hebrew Congregation remarked “These Catholic students are just great” as our time there was coming to a close. The work we do not only represents the individual but the Catholic University of America as an institution.

Service work is almost a step toward justice but more of a means to aid the handicap the "have-nots” have over the “haves”. The inequality in our country today is divisive and hurts not only the individual but the overall strength of our country. While working with the Homeless Food Run service opportunity, I trudged through the slush and snow of early December. Service leader Tim Lewcun remarked that the difficulty with finding people to take the food and clothes we had was an anomaly. He explained that usually people would gather at a sp...

... middle of paper ...

...ime cleaning someone else's mess.

In total I would like to express my own ideas and thoughts that have evolved since my incident which resulted in my sanctions. I did not view marijuana use as immoral or wrong except in a legal sense. District law as well as campus policy prohibit use of marijuana and any such paraphernalia. My thoughts remain true but now with my involvement with the office of the Dean of Students has pushed my thought process toward a new mindset. I, like most of my peers, am an optimistic college student who wishes for a successful future. I want to help the homeless people I met on the streets of D.C. I want to help support the small communities that just need a little help like Brooklyn. If I want to really help these people I must be smart and be an outstanding citizen who obeys the law. My use and thinking of marijuana have evolved greatly.