Ellenor Simmons, director director of the Crescent Alliance Recovery Effort, speaks at a May 13 dedication ceremony for an ecumenical rebuilding project in a hurricane-devastated New Orleans neighborhood. In the middle of the photo is Aidsand Wright-Riggins, Executive Director of National Ministries for the American Baptist Churches USA, who spoke at the ceremony. (PHOTO/CWS)

“Yes, there is work to be done,” said ABC National Ministries Executive Director Aidsand Wright-Riggins, "but we as a people of faith working together have accomplished something good.”

Wright-Riggins and ABC intercultural-ministries coordinator Ken George participated in the ceremony, according to a press release from Church World Service.

CWS, the relief-and-development arm of the National Council of Churches, sponsored the project to rebuild 12 houses in New Orleans' Little Woods neighborhood. Little Woods is a former fishing camp on the shores of Lake Ponchartrain, several miles northeast of downtown New Orleans.

The homes were rebuilt in 30 days with the help of approximately 500 volunteers from several different denominations, including the ABC, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, the United Church of Christ and the United Methodist Church.

The houses were completed for residents who had exhausted their resources trying to rebuild themselves, but still did not have livable homes. While the neighborhood still has significant rebuilding left before it, Wright-Riggins said, “This is cause for celebration in the midst of despair.”

American Baptist volunteer Cheryl Dudley, who spent a week taping, measuring and hammering alongside other volunteers and local residents, said she believes the group effort “made a difference in our understanding of God’s grace and the real purpose of ecumenical mission.”

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