Hurricane Katrina devastated the congregation where Rev. Jean Marie Peacock served as Associate Pastor. Two parishioners lost their lives and 90% lost their homes, including Peacock and her husband.

Twenty years later, she still tears up.

Resilience doesn’t mean “getting over” that, Peacock said in a plenary address at Stewardship Kaleidoscope Sept. 23 in New Orleans. The annual conference is presented by the Presbyterian Church (USA) and Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.

It means drawing on community, justice, faith and hope, even when confronting the seemingly impossible. “Resiliency is a gift God cultivates in and among us. It’s grounded in community, shaped by justice, rooted in faith, and sustained by hope. God entrusts us to be stewards of these gifts, so that we not only survive life’s challenges, we thrive.”

Community

Peacock recalled a church member asking: “How in the world are we ever going to rebuild our church, our homes? Everything is destroyed.”

Though overwhelmed herself, Peacock replied: “We are not alone.”

“I told her that prayers, funds and offers of assistance and volunteers were already pouring into Presbyterian Disaster Assistance. I said we are part of a connectional church that will help see us through it all.”

Relationships of care and justice are important when we feel helpless in the face of need and suffering, Peacock said. “It’s hard to be resilient by yourself, isn’t it?”

Justice

Around the corner from the hotel where the Stewardship Kaleidoscope participants were gathered is the New Orleans Ernest N. Morial Convention Center. There, thousands of Hurricane Katrina evacuees sheltered amid fear and confusion. Not far is the Superdome, where even more suffered for days.

“The world saw with painful clarity that it is always the poorest of the poor who are left behind,” Peacock said. Twenty-five percent of the population of New Orleans did not have the resources, such as a vehicle, to even evacuate, she added.

That’s why people of faith didn’t stop with emergency aid.

Peacock founded Project Homecoming in partnership with Presbyterian Disaster Assistance and the Presbytery of South Louisiana. Over 10,000 volunteers worked with the organization to rebuild over 350 homes.

“Project Homecoming is a reminder that resilience is not just about short-term fixes,” she said. “What began as volunteers cleaning and mucking out houses grew into a ministry of restoration, affordable housing and workforce development. True resilience addresses the root causes that make people vulnerable in the first place.”

Faith

In Katrina’s aftermath, someone asked Peacock how she managed.

“I said, ‘The first thing I do when I wake up is, I pray. I cry. Once I’ve given all of the anxieties and the questions and the hurt and the pain to God, and after I’ve shared my loss and grief, and after I’ve confessed my need for God’s help and sought God’s direction, after I’ve gotten it all out of my system and given it all over to God — well, then I’m ready to start the day.’”

Peacock shared the story of Brenda, who lost her home and belongings in the storm. Then a fraudulent contractor stole her insurance money. Years after Katrina, she found herself homeless and suicidal.

Brenda doubted Project Homecoming would actually rebuild her home. The volunteers kept at it week after week until the work was done, mending her broken heart in the process.

“Resilience is grounded in faith that makes space for questions, grief and honesty,” Peacock said. “It holds lament and hope together.”

Hope

Hope lifts our eyes beyond the rubble, said Peacock, now the organizing pastor of the Be Well-Come Together new worshiping community in Harvey, Louisiana.

“When we are resilient, we take time for gratitude and look for signs of God’s presence and power at work in our world and in our lives,” she said.

One sign spoke vividly to Peacock and her husband when they returned to the ruins of their home after Katrina.

Muck and mud covered the floor, mold had grown up the walls and rubble lay everywhere. In the kitchen, a needlepoint still hung on the wall, untouched by flood waters or mold. “Bless This Home,” it read.

“We were in the presence of a God whose divine grace and love extend even into the mess, hurt and pain to lift us up and raise us to new life,” she said. “So let us persevere as stewards of community, justice, faith and hope – resilient, not because of our own strength, but because of God’s unfailing love and resurrecting power.