Apricot Scones: My Path to the Discovery of Happiness

Chapter 1: Miss Erica Jackson

Miracles come in many forms. Sometimes, you wouldn't believe when or where they're coming from, but when you need a miracle, God always sends one. Our's not only came in the form of a woman, but a friend.

At the time, I was a freshman in high school. I had been going to our Sunday School program since before I could remember. It was a sweet, cozy place in Canton Ohio, but it was anything but small. The church was a large community and growing larger by the day, but rough times had hit. Losing priest after priest. Soon after, the leader of our Sunday School program decided it was her time to leave. We were truly desperate.

Along came that precious wind of change though. In the late summer and early fall of 2014, a young woman took command of the reins, stoping a spiraling disaster and putting the pieces back together. Once we had a foundation, she began a new and improved youth program for us high schoolers. It was new to all of us, even though a few of us had been there for several years.

The first day of our faith formation, I had entered the small blue building next to the Church, we called the "Youth House." It's actual name was the "Fete house," named after our late priest, Father Fete.

I wasn't sure what to expect. None of us were. As I approached the small doorway, inside were a series of chairs and couches arranged in a circle all around the outside edge of the large room. On the end closest to the door was a small, slat-screen T.V. on a small stand and a dry-erase board on the wall with the name "Erica Jackson" in red marker.

Spread across the room were all of my friends. New people, old faces. People I grew up with and others I had know for maybe a week. There was a woman at the small table with the T.V. She quickly turned to me and spread out a large smile.

With the brightest tone if voice, she took a deep breathe and said, "Hi, I'm Erica and I'll be your youth leader." Her voice was soothing and warm, yet excited and full of energy. Something I wasn't used to at my church. She quickly turned down and handed me a marker and a name tag. I hadn't even had time to introduce myself.

I turned around to a couch in the corner of the room and set next to some friends. On the name tag, I wrote out "Christian," but that wasn't all. Miss Erica had us all put down a hashtag, and with it, a word that described yourself but started with the first letter of your name. Lacking in creativity but running out of time, I quickly wrote down #Christian.

So when the time began, everyone went around and introduced themselves with fantastic hashtags, all sharing laughs. Then Erica began to talk about herself. She started with her name, Miss Erica Jackson, then continued on to her child hood, where she had gone to school. Things that normal teachers would go through. Boring boring. But one thing stood out. Earlier on in her life, she had worked at a home for the developmentally disabled. A home called Misericordia Heart of Mercy in Chicago, Illinois.

At first, it really hadn't concerned or stood out to me. Everyones gotta make money somehow. What place was I in to judge her, but doing such a thing would not have been my cup of tea. As the year went on, Miss Erica worked more with the topic of Misericordia, especially during Respect Life month and purification of culture lessons, explaining to us that people with developmental disabilities are the main targets of abortion or mass killings, due to the fact that they are different. It really hurt to hear about this throughout the world and so learning about this "Heart of Mercy" quickly became a topic we all wanted.

The more we learned, the more interested we became. The more interested we became, the more involved we became. As the year came to an end, we were certain, we had to go to Misericordia. The entire operation had become much larger than I think even Erica had imagined. We began car washes and collections at mass. Anything we could do to raise the money we needed to go. A small group of us, fourteen kids and five adults, had raised the funds and put in the time and effort to spend one week, six days, in Chicago.

None of it would have ever been possible without the saint herself, Erica Jackson. Anyone who subscribes to coincidence seriously needs their head checked because everything happens the way it does for a reason. Every little moment is planned out. If even the smallest little event hadn't gone the way it did, we may have never gotten the chance to go to Misericordia. It was all part of a greater plan. A plan from God.