CRUX 2019
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Photo: Marc-Yves Regis<br />
Campers, and inset, founder Marc-Yves Regis, at this year's summer camp in the Dominican Republic.<br />
When faced with a moral dilemma, many people in the<br />
1990s used a phrase that was in vogue in popular culture<br />
— “What Would Jesus Do?”<br />
In the Gospels, Jesus set many examples for Christians to follow.<br />
He commanded us to love our neighbor, give to the poor, feed<br />
the hungry, and take care of the widows and children, especially<br />
orphans. He also commanded us to follow Him.<br />
Marc-Yves Regis, parishioner at Trinity, Collinsville, decided to follow<br />
Jesus and start a summer camp, first in the Dominican Republican<br />
in 2009, and a year later in his native country of Haiti. While growing<br />
up in the island nation, he saw Haitian farmers leaving in caravans to<br />
go work in bateyes or sugarcane plantations across the border, and<br />
they never returned home. He always wondered what happened<br />
to them, and as an adult, he pursued a lifelong dream to document<br />
their peril.<br />
Beginning in 1994, he began traveling to the Dominican Republic<br />
each year to research, photograph, and gather enough material<br />
to write a book about what he witnessed. He fell in love with the<br />
people, and instead of only documenting what he saw, he spent<br />
more time helping them with their basic needs. He began taking<br />
clothes and money to share among farmers — eventually they<br />
began to feel like family.<br />
“I stopped looking at the people as subjects for a book and began<br />
looking at them as brothers and sisters.” Marc explained.<br />
Eventually, after many years, he finished the book, When Freedom<br />
Comes, about the plight of Haitian braceros (farm workers), and is<br />
looking for a publisher.<br />
Over the years, he noticed that the children in the sugarcane<br />
plantations did not have any toys to play with. Nor were there any<br />
fun activities to occupy their time during the long, hot summer. As<br />
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