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By Erika Anderson, Staff Writer
WINDER—As the chartered bus pulls into the camp, the
volunteers stand by ready to go.
From behind tinted windows, one sees the silhouettes of rapidly
waving hands. Flattened noses, faces pushed up against the dark glass, indicate
the many pairs of excited eyes eagerly scanning the crowd for a glimpse of
their friends.
This is it. This is the event for which they wait all year long.
The arrival at Camp Will-A-Way is just the beginning of an activity-packed
weekend that meets the needs of those with disabilities, and quite often,
touches the hearts of those who serve them.
It is at this camp, located at Fort Yargo State Park, just off
Highway 316 in Winder, where God’s creation meets man’s
invention—the rays of the hot sun reflecting off the shiny silver of an
electric wheelchair or a walker. It is here that life-changing relationships
begin between those considered by the world to be healthy and those who have
felt the pain of exclusivity by that same world. Here, at the Re-Creation
Retreat, those two groups come together to teach each other a lesson in
unconditional love.
Held each year since 1973 during Mother’s Day weekend, the
Re-Creation Retreat is geared toward special education students from pre-school
through adulthood, offering spiritual, social and recreational time for
campers, who are paired up with a counselor, allowing for one-on-one
interaction.
It is impossible to talk about Camp Will-A-Way without talking
about the late Toni Miralles. She founded the Ministry for Persons With
Disabilities at St. Jude the Apostle Church, Atlanta, in 1973, as a way to help
her daughter, Felicia, who is mildly retarded, and others like her, participate
more fully in the church.
Toni Miralles touched the lives of many. She died in September
2000 after a brief struggle with cancer, leaving others to carry on the
ministry. A tree sits on the bank of the lake at Camp Will-A-Way, planted in
her memory. The small flowering cherry tree will grow, as did her ministry,
with outstretched branches, much like her open arms that embraced those not
always accepted by society.
Her husband of 46 years, Joe, said that the camp and the ministry
were “the love of her life.” He said that Camp Will-A-Way was an
ingredient in the glue that formed the tight bond between members of the
Miralles family, who often volunteered at the camp together.
“It was about togetherness. Everybody pitched in and did
things and we learned together,” he said. “The biggest thing was just
being together.”
He called the tree-planting ceremony, held on the first night of
this year’s camp, a “marvelous tribute” to his wife. The tree
was purchased with funding from a scholarship won by Yvonne Noggle, a graduate
of St. Pius X High School, Atlanta, who has served as a counselor at the camp.
Earlier this year, the chapel in the religious education offices of St. Jude
was dedicated in memory of Toni Miralles.
Joe Miralles recalled the gradual growth of the camp, starting out
very small but growing to over 80 campers this year.
“One of the most beautiful things I have seen out of the
whole thing has been the young people who are counselors,” he said.
“They’re all fantastic. They have learned and they have brought other
people in.”
Counselors range from teenagers to adults, but each shares the
commitment to the campers and the ministry of the retreat. Joe Miralles
remembers one especially dedicated camper who lived in Athens.
“He couldn’t get a ride, so he biked 20 miles down there
(to the camp),” he said. “It blew my mind.”
The camp itself is picturesque, with green sloping hills and a
lake, which on Saturday of the camp is the centerpiece of outside activities.
Campers and counselors spend the day fishing and on paddle boats or specially
designed pontoon boats that allow those in wheelchairs to cruise around the
lake.
Libby Blanton has been involved with the camp since the early
1990s. Her son, Drew, who suffered serious head injuries in a car accident as a
small child, has been attending the camp since 1989. It was through
Blanton’s friendship with Toni Miralles that she became involved with the
annual retreat. She began volunteering after seeing the joy that the camp gave
her son.
“When we leave Camp Will-A-Way, we don’t make it the
three miles to (Highway) 316 before Drew is already talking about next
year,” she said. “It was a place that for the first time he felt
totally accepted and embraced for who he was.”
Blanton said her first impression of the camp was “how in the
world does this thing run?”
“I was overwhelmed with what I knew had to go into the
planning of this.”
Blanton experienced this firsthand, as she and Tricia Miller, who
now heads the ministry at St. Jude’s, began working months ahead of the
retreat, putting together campers and counselors as well as the hundreds of
other details necessary to pull off the weekend.
Campers and their counselors are each assigned to one of 16
cabins. They are put into groups that perform various tasks, such as set up and
clean up for meals. These groups also divide activity time on Saturday between
games of bingo, banner-making and the craft cabin, where campers often make
gifts for their mothers for Mother’s Day. Counselors spend the entire
weekend with their campers, but are given free time after the campers go to
sleep. Blanton said the giving spirit of those who are involved with the camp
has touched her.
“Everybody there loves everybody so much,” she said.
“It’s genuine—just so real. Those campers love the people with
such intensity. I always tell the counselors ‘you have no idea how
important you are to your camper.’”
Joe Miralles echoes that statement.
“We would get calls months in advance from campers saying,
‘Who’s my counselor this year? Who’s in my cabin?’ They
were always so excited,” he said.
Prior to learning she had cancer, Toni Miralles had decided to
retire and chose Tricia Miller to take over the ministry that was so dear to
her heart.
“It was such an honor for her to ask me,” Miller said.
“She really thought of these people as her friends and she was very
protective of the group.”
Miller became involved in the ministry in 1992 while she was in
the process of converting to Catholicism at St. Jude. It was through the
ministry that Miller met her husband, Dave. She said she instantly felt
accepted by those with disabilities.
“They didn’t care where I had gone to school or what
kind of car I drove or what my salary was,” she said. “They just
cared about me because I was their friend. That was so special to me.”
Miller and her husband, as well as their three children, attend
the camp, which she calls “a little bit of heaven on earth.” She said
her life would not be the same without the extended family she has met through
the ministry.
“I think it connects me more to what’s important in
life,” she said. “Our friends with disabilities—those are our
saints on earth. They make mistakes just like everybody else, but when it comes
to the faith and love that’s held back sometimes like we do, they
don’t have that. That’s true faith, that’s true love.”
At the end of each day of the retreat, campers and counselors
participate in a prayer service. Msgr. David Talley, chancellor for the
archdiocese, has served as a chaplain for over 10 years after the original
chaplain, Father John Kelley, died.
Though his schedule is full, Msgr. Talley said that he marks off
the Will-A-Way weekend each year. He cited the work of two Catholic men, who
have served extensively with those with disabilities, as a reason that he stays
involved with the ministry.
“Those that live with the effects of a physical or mental
disorder bring to the church the witness of vulnerability,” he said.
“The ‘little ones’ that Jean Vanier and Henri Nouwen mention in
their work bring to us a call—to simplify our lives, our
spirituality,” he said. “As in most every aspect of ministry, I
receive much more than I give, and learn much more than I teach. With
God’s grace, I will stay involved with this community of little ones. I am
blessed to be a part of them.”
That blessing is obvious as Msgr. Talley celebrates a closing Mass
each year at the camp.
Saturday night of the Re-Creation Retreat is reserved for a dance.
Each year a DJ provides music for the campers, who dance into the early evening
in an outdoor pavilion of the camp.
Following the Mass on Sunday, a group picture is taken, and
campers and counselors pack up their things to go home. As the counselors stand
by, watching as campers leave on the bus, those same waving hands are visible.
But now, they are familiar. They are the hands of their friends. Though most
leave the camp exhausted, at the same time, they are exuberant.
“Those camps were always incredibly tiring, but it was the
kind of tired that when you finished, you felt really good,” said Joe
Miralles.
Those who knew her best know that from her heavenly home, Toni
Miralles feels the same way. |
