ANOTHER TEAR JERKER
I took a team of eight men to a community south of New Orleans called Violet, where we were to clean out a house belonging to a pastor. This community had from six to eight feet of water in their buildings. This fellow's house was raised up so he had only about three feet of water.
His house was a sad story in that he had no flood insurance so it had no coverage for the destruction and loss of everything in the house, but that wasn't the saddest part of the story. The pastor is 63 years old and has lived in that community most of his life. About six years ago he planted a new church after buying a grocery store building and remodeling it. He signed the note from the bank and used his own house for collateral. He had built the church up to 55 people and then Katrina hit.
The following are a few photos of what is left of his church building and his house. There was a farm on the windward side of the church building and several large hay bales were washed into the side of the church and knocked the concrete wall in and are now inside the church. The county has condemned the building and will tear it down. There are no people living in this community so his church people are gone and his building is gone as well.
We piled his household possessions in a pile next to the street and all he has left is an empty shell of a house with a mortgage on a church building that is worthless. His wife has cancer and she says that she is not moving back to the community.
As the pastor talked with us during the day, as we cleaned out his house, I don't think that I saw him without tears in his eyes any part of the day.
I took a team of eight men to a community south of New Orleans called Violet, where we were to clean out a house belonging to a pastor. This community had from six to eight feet of water in their buildings. This fellow's house was raised up so he had only about three feet of water.
His house was a sad story in that he had no flood insurance so it had no coverage for the destruction and loss of everything in the house, but that wasn't the saddest part of the story. The pastor is 63 years old and has lived in that community most of his life. About six years ago he planted a new church after buying a grocery store building and remodeling it. He signed the note from the bank and used his own house for collateral. He had built the church up to 55 people and then Katrina hit.
The following are a few photos of what is left of his church building and his house. There was a farm on the windward side of the church building and several large hay bales were washed into the side of the church and knocked the concrete wall in and are now inside the church. The county has condemned the building and will tear it down. There are no people living in this community so his church people are gone and his building is gone as well.
We piled his household possessions in a pile next to the street and all he has left is an empty shell of a house with a mortgage on a church building that is worthless. His wife has cancer and she says that she is not moving back to the community.
As the pastor talked with us during the day, as we cleaned out his house, I don't think that I saw him without tears in his eyes any part of the day.
posted by Jim Burton at 8:07 AM
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