• Skip to main content
  • Skip to secondary menu
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
Catholic Review

Catholic Review

Inspiring the Archdiocese of Baltimore

Menu
  • Home
  • News
        • Local News
        • World News
        • Vatican News
        • Obituaries
        • Featured Video
        • En Español
        • Sports News
        • Official Clergy Assignments
        • Schools News
  • Commentary
        • Contributors
          • Question Corner
          • George Weigel
          • Effie Caldarola
          • John Garvey
          • Father Ed Dougherty, M.M.
          • Guest Commentary
        • CR Columnists
          • Archbishop William E. Lori
          • Rita Buettner
          • Christopher Gunty
          • George Matysek Jr.
          • Father Joseph Breighner
          • Father Collin Poston
          • Robyn Barberry
          • Hanael Bianchi
          • Amen Columns
  • Entertainment
        • Events
        • Movie & Television Reviews
        • Arts & Culture
        • Books
        • Recipes
  • About Us
        • Contact Us
        • Our History
        • Meet Our Staff
        • Photos to own
        • Books/CDs/Prayer Cards
        • CR Media platforms
        • Electronic Edition
  • Advertising
  • Shop
        • Purchase Photos
        • Books/CDs/Prayer Cards
  • CR Radio
  • News Tips
  • Subscribe
Micah Buser, a resident of Short Gap, W.Va., is a parishioner of Our Lady of the Mountains in Cumberland and serves as a cantor at St. Patrick. (Emily Rosenthal/CR Staff)

Cumberland parishioner strengthens faith on mission trip

September 20, 2018
By Emily Rosenthal Alster
Filed Under: #IamCatholic, Faces of Faith, Feature, Local News, Missions, News

CUMBERLAND – In early July, on a mission trip to St. Marc, Haiti, recent high-school graduate Micah Buser saw a little boy happily playing soccer using a rock in place of a ball.

It made her realize the importance of gratitude.

“The children and the people there have a bigger effect on you than you could ever have on them,” said 18-year-old Buser.

Buser, a resident of Short Gap, W.Va., and a parishioner of Our Lady of the Mountains in Cumberland, was on a mission trip to Haiti sponsored by the Archdiocese of Baltimore July 1-7 that did not return until July 11 due to delays resulting from unrest in the country.

“She was very impressive in the way she handled everything,” said Rachel Barron Bowles, a program assistant with the archdiocesan Missions Office who led the trip. “Even from the very beginning (of the trip) she seemed very solid. … She had such a wisdom beyond her years.”

Before her trip to Haiti, Buser had never been out of the country – or even on an airplane.

“I was really scared and afraid that I wasn’t going to fit in or really enjoy it as much as I knew I should have,” Buser said. “But once I got there, I had this overwhelming sense of home that I haven’t felt in a really long time. I felt like that was God telling me this is where I need to be.”

Buser and the other volunteers spent their week teaching English classes, making crafts and playing games with the students of the Good Samaritans School.

Micah Buser, a parishioner of Our Lady of the Mountains in Cumberland, spent early July in St. Marc, Haiti, on a mission trip with the Archdiocese of Baltimore. (Courtesy Micah Buser)

The happiness she felt strengthened her faith, which she said was in a “dry spell” prior to the trip.

“It wasn’t that I was doubting God’s existence, that never happened at all,” she said. “I felt really unworthy of even talking to him, so I just wouldn’t, and then I grew further apart from him.”

Her disconnect from her faith was one reason she was dreading the trip, she said.

“When I got there … I just felt so comfortable and I could feel God’s presence more so than I had in two years,” Buser said. “I could remember him telling me in weird ways, ‘This is where you’re supposed to be, this is what you’re supposed to dedicate your life to.’”

Buser said she now sees everything in a positive light.

“I know it’s because I’ve felt God’s presence in a way that I had been lacking for so long,” she said.

Buser said she likes the sense of togetherness she feels in the Catholic faith.

“When I find out someone is a Christian, I automatically feel connected with them,” she said, “but you find out they are Catholic (and) you feel even more connected. You may have never met someone, but if you see them do the Sign of the Cross, you know there’s a connection between you and that other person.”

Buser loves music and shares her talents as a cantor at St. Patrick in Cumberland, part of the Our Lady of the Mountains pastorate.

At the end of August, she followed in the footsteps of her sister, Carly, 25, and brother, Stefan, 21, and entered West Virginia University in Morgantown, where she will study music education.

“I would help people around me, and I realized teaching in general was my passion, and I love music,” said Buser, who started as a violinist, but now concentrates on the saxophone. “So I would love to teach music.”

After her confirmation, Buser gained valuable teaching experience through her parish’s religious education program, first as an aide to a second grade class, and then as a catechist to a seventh grade class.

“When I would teach those (difficult concepts) to them and they would actually understand them and they’d get all excited about them – I thought that was really cool,” Buser said, adding that many of the lessons she learned in her own catechesis sunk in as she matured. “I want them, as they get older, to realize what I was saying will apply to their life.”

At West Virginia University, Buser plans to get involved with campus ministry and inquire about mission trips. She also encourages young faithful to seek an experience like hers in Haiti.

“There’s always that fear of the unknown but they have to learn to turn that fear into excitement and motivation,” Buser said, when asked what she would say to her peers considering a mission trip. “I would tell them to pray about it and realize that God is always calling us to be his missionary disciples.

“What better way to fulfill that call than to go on a mission trip to Haiti?”

Read more Faces of Faith profiles here. 

Email Emily Rosenthal at erosenthal@CatholicReview.org

 

 

Print Print

Primary Sidebar

Emily Rosenthal Alster

Emily Rosenthal Alster, a former staff writer for the Catholic Review, is a contributing writer. She is a lifelong resident of Maryland and a parishioner of St. John in Westminster.

Emily is a graduate of Delone Catholic High School in McSherrystown, Pa. She holds a bachelor's degree in business communication from Stevenson University.

View all posts from this author

For the latest news delivered twice a week via email or text message, sign up to receive our free enewsletter.

| MOST POPULAR |

  • Priest who offered up cancer for clerical abuse victims says he was healed at Lourdes
  • All are welcome: Finding a home at Mount St. Joseph
  • Tuition at Catholic high schools in Baltimore archdiocese significantly lower than other area private schools
  • Movie Review: ‘Knock at the Cabin’
  • Religious leaders share vocation stories with Cockeysville students

| Latest Local News |

Sister Margarita Musquera, O.S.P., dies at 93.

Archdiocese dispenses with meatless obligation for St. Patrick’s Day

Religious leaders share vocation stories with Cockeysville students

| Latest World News |

Shock, despair and mourning in Aleppo amid ‘terror’ of the earthquake, local bishops say

U.S. bishops’ religious liberty chairman: Proposed new rules on contraceptive mandate ‘disheartening’

Diplomats, faith leaders gathered at U.N. urged to advance religious tolerance, harmony around world

| Catholic Review Radio |

CatholicReview · Catholic Review Radio

Footer

Our Vision

Real Life. Real Faith. 

Catholic Review Media communicates the Gospel and its impact on people’s lives in the Archdiocese of Baltimore and beyond.

Our Mission

Catholic Review Media provides intergenerational communications that inform, teach, inspire and engage Catholics and all of good will in the mission of Christ through diverse forms of media.

Contact

Catholic Review
320 Cathedral Street
Baltimore, MD 21201
443-524-3150
mail@CatholicReview.org

 

Social Media

  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Twitter
  • YouTube

Recent

  • Sister Margarita Musquera, O.S.P., dies at 93.
  • Archdiocese dispenses with meatless obligation for St. Patrick’s Day
  • Religious leaders share vocation stories with Cockeysville students
  • Shock, despair and mourning in Aleppo amid ‘terror’ of the earthquake, local bishops say
  • U.S. bishops’ religious liberty chairman: Proposed new rules on contraceptive mandate ‘disheartening’
  • Question Corner: Must I believe in and follow apparitions?
  • Movie Review: Lourdes
  • Diplomats, faith leaders gathered at U.N. urged to advance religious tolerance, harmony around world
  • Russia poses ‘biggest threat to religious freedom in Ukraine,’ says archbishop

Search

Membership

Catholic Press Association of the United States and Canada

Maryland-Delaware-DC Press Association

The Associated Church Press

© 2023 CATHOLIC REVIEW MEDIA, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED