Campus ministry said to shape lives, build community

A campus ministry at the Louisiana State University Eunice helps shape the lives of students, but also builds a culture to serve the community in the future said Joseph Nelson, campus minister at the LSUE Catholic Student Center.
“The students at LSUE, right now, they are going be the bankers at Tri-Parish Bank,” Nelson said. “They are going to the teachers at Eunice High School. They are going to be the small business owners in Eunice. By investing in them now, by teaching them how to be servant leaders and how to really invest in their community, we are going to draw the benefits in the future.”
Nelson and Maggie Parks, a former LSUE and St. Edmund High School student, were speakers at at the Thursday Eunice Kiwanis Club meeting.
Nelson, who started at the center this month, is graduate of St. Joseph Seminary College.
“I think most don’t realize there is a desire for purposeful belonging,” he said of students.
Nelson said he discovered the Catholic student ministry while attending the University of Louisiana at Lafayette.
“They are very open they really accepted me for what I was and allowed me to join them in those experiences.”
Parks, who said plans to attend UL Lafayette to obtain a bachelor’s degree in art education and then study for a master’s degree in theology, said the LSUE center “was pretty cool they are really welcoming.”
The center helped her learn new ways of a following Christ, she said.
A major event for the center is a noon Mass on Wednesdays followed by a lunch attended by about 50 people.
The center is located on university land in a building owned by the Diocese of Lafayette, Nelson said. Maintenance support comes from St. Thomas More Church Parish.
One goal for the center is to generate more of its own operating funds, rather than relying on church parish money, Nelson said.