Almost any other year, students from the Baptist Student Union of East Carolina State University would have gone somewhere near home to perform their annual spring break project.
One year they went to South Carolina to build houses for the poor. In other years, they went to nearby states like Florida to offer good deeds there.
This year, they came to Secaucus – choosing it as a jumping-off point to lend their hand to the relief efforts at the World Trade Center site.
As soon as Steven Harding saw the tragedy unfolding in New York City on television last September, he knew where he and his fellow students had to come for their 2002 trip.
A religious man – studying for the ministry – Harding admits a certain spiritual feeling connected with the impulse to come north. Like many Americans who witnessed the attack on the World Trade Center, he felt the need to take a positive action, to lend his hand to heal the wounds inflicted upon New York City and the country.
“We didn’t know what we were going to do when we got here; we just knew we had to come,” he said.
Harding said other people involved with the ministry felt the same way, and it became the subject of their talk when they gathered on Sept. 11 for a prayer service.
“We knew we couldn’t come north right away and that we wouldn’t be able to do something until after winter, but we needed to come,” he said.
Each of them, he said, felt the shock on that moment, and wanted to reach out.
“We had lot of time to plan, but knew that when we got here there would be something for us do,” Harding said.
Part of the planning involved an extensive use of the Internet, seeking out places to stay. That’s when the group came upon one of the Secaucus web sites, one of the two that provides information about the town and local facilities.
Donald Roberts, a member of the congregation of the Church of Our Saviour in Secaucus, had set up the site about four years ago. The site technically belongs to the church, but provides a vast amount of information about the town, its public officials, schools, and other highlights. It also has a listing of hotels and business, and links to many of the booking facilities.
“We thought it would be a service to the community,” Roberts said. “We always consider ourselves part of Secaucus, and we love the town.”
Harding said that his group did a web search and the page came up. At first, they didn’t know the site was hosted by the church. They called it an added blessing when they discovered that fact.
The group sent a message to the web site, and Rev. Mark Lewis, pastor of Our Saviour, received the message.
“The group decided to come north using Secaucus as a base of operation,” Rev. Lewis said. “They planned their whole trip north using our site.”
Members of the Student Union as well as parishioners from the Oakmont Baptist Church made hotel reservations at the Secaucus MainStay Suites. On March 9, the town provided bus transportation from the hotel to the church so that the members could participate in church services at Our Saviour before going off to help out at Ground Zero in New York.
While several rescue groups declined the offer of the missionaries from the south, New York Cares welcomed them, and offered to put them to some chores near the disaster zone at the south tip of Manhattan.
“They were excited to have us,” Harding said. “We wanted to try and plug in with an exciting programs that needed volunteers. Some programs didn’t need anybody. Then we discovered New York Cares.”