STEUBENVILLE, OH—This spring break, hundreds of students will forego vacations and instead serve the poorest of the poor on 13 domestic and international missions. Completely student led, organized, and funded, the missions are sponsored by Franciscan University of Steubenville’s Missions of Peace.

“In all of our missions, we’re serving and loving people in every stage of life, in every circumstance,” says Rhett Young, director of Missionary Outreach at Franciscan University. “Father Michael Scanlan, TOR, (former president of Franciscan University) would say not to worry and just ‘go and preach Jesus,’ and I think that’s the simplest way to describe what our students do on mission.”

Missions of Peace sponsors a total of 22 missions every year, including spring break, summer, and winter missions.

This year’s spring break missions include Arizona, Belize, New York City, Chicago, Ecuador, Honduras, New Mexico, Nicaragua, North Dakota, Los Angeles, Son Life-Florida, and Steubenville, Ohio.

The mission in Steubenville focuses on bringing the light of Christ into the downtown areas of Steubenville through door-to-door evangelization, street ministry, serving in soup kitchens, homeless ministry, and various service projects. The University’s Austria Program also sends students to missions in Hungary, Romania, Slovakia, and Lourdes, France.

Students will be joined by 32 advisors, including 21 religious sisters, brothers, and priests.

For the first time, all Missions of Peace student leaders attended a leadership retreat prior to the start of this academic year. The retreat aimed to help them grow in the virtues of leadership, humility, love, and seeing Christ in those they would serve on mission.

This retreat was in addition to the annual Mission Immersion Day, to be held March 3, which marks the final training for nearly 300 students before they travel across the U.S. and Western hemisphere.

The students must cover all of their expenses for transportation, lodging, meals, and supplies. For domestic missions, they individually raise between $600 and $1,500, and for international missions, they raise between $1,200 and $2,800.

For more information, visit Missions of Peace.