Tuesday, March 22 was a day of sweet reunions. Some of the mentors and students from our Berkeley church in California flew over to Boston. But what do they have to do with the mentors and students here at Reclaimer Church? And what were they doing in Boston?

Long-Distance Connections

Our visitors were all part of Berkeley Klesis, a Christian fellowship for students at the University of California, Berkeley. Many of our current church members moved from Berkeley to start the church here, so there were many people who were either good friends back in college or reunited with a mentor they had as undergrads. For example, Isaac, Emilio, and Joy, three of our CPIs, were part of Berkeley Klesis before moving to Boston and were reunited with both peers, older brothers and sisters, and mentors. Josh and Jacqui Wang, who help lead our church here, are part of the same graduating class as Myra Chen who currently leads Berkeley Klesis with her husband Ander. Myra and Jacqui have been close friends since they were college students — that’s more than a decade of friendship!

As someone from our North Carolina church, I also have a connection with Ander and Myra Chen: they moved from California to North Carolina in 2017 to help start our North Carolina church, which I joined my sophomore year as a college student at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. They moved back to California in 2020, just before the start of my senior year, to help with the needs at our Berkeley church. They were mentors for not just me but also the three other CPIs who graduated from UNC – Caleb, Hannah O., and Yoo-Jin – and they taught us a lot about what it looks like to live life as a Christian.

Boston through College Campuses

The next day our Berkeley Klesis visitors spent the morning touring college campuses in small groups. My group went to Harvard University first. There, walked through Harvard Yard, the oldest and perhaps most recognizable part of the ivy league that housed many famous people including Founding Father John Hancock and actor Matt Damon. We also stopped by the John Harvard Statue, one of the most photographed statues in the United States (do you know why it’s known as the “statue of three lies?”).

Our next stop was Tufts University, which boasts an awesome view of the Boston skyline. Our main tour guide there was Jon Scott. He and his wife Kim, who are now mentors for students at Tufts, were previously mentors in Berkeley Klesis and helped mentor the c/o 2021, Joy, Isaac, and Emilio’s class! We passed by Jumbo, the elephant statue in front of Tuft’s Barnum Hall, named after P.T. Barnum the father of circuses and whose story inspired the musical The Greatest Showman.

Teaming Up and Reaching Out

After the Boston campus tours, a subset of mentors and students from Berkeley Klesis went to Boston University, the campus I currently minister to, and helped spread word about our special talk that evening, “Aren’t All Religions Basically the Same?” For many students, it was their first time doing outreach and also their first time on the BU campus! We were very thankful they came all the way from the West Coast to help out with our churches in the Northeast as these kinds of trips were often the highlight of many people’s college experiences.

A Growing Network of Relationships

I’m very thankful that I got to see Ander and Myra and to meet so many mentors and students from Berkeley Klesis. Now I, as well as the rest of us here in Boston, have more connections with our Berkeley church and the students there. The visitors from our Berkeley church left on Thursday, but the visits weren’t over! The same day, mentors and students from our church in Los Angeles, California flew in. But what do they have to do with the mentors and students here at Boston? And what were they doing in Boston? That’s enough for another post.