A Year of Mission Work Brings Understanding to Diplomacy Freshman

Bosco Budelman had the opportunity to embark on a year of missionary work during his gap year before enrolling in the Diplomacy bachelor’s program at Seton Hall University. In fall 2025, Budelman became part of a missionary team made up of a family and two other young men. Their mission was simple: to announce Jesus Christ and the Good News to everyone they met.

At the beginning of their mission, they traveled throughout New England. Their days were active and they gave talks, went door to door and held Masses and retreats. Bosco learned “very quickly that missionary work requires patience, humility, courage and perseverance.” He also became a more effective evangelist, throughout this time taking his first steps toward learning that “evangelization isn’t about forcing anything on someone. It’s about being willing to approach another person, listen to them and offer them the joy and hope that you’ve received yourself.”

As the year progressed, Bosco and his companions continued their mission from their home base of Boston. They traveled into Maine, rural New England and even to a church retreat in the Dominican Republic. Some days were full of joy and learning. For instance, Bosco remembers how the church retreat and interacting with other missionaries from all over the world reinforced to him “that the mission we were participating in was much bigger than ourselves.”

Other days were a true challenge. On any given day, Bosco might work among the homeless of small-town Massachusetts and take part in a procession through Boston with the bishop. For Bosco, “accepting difficulty and suffering was part of learning what it means to truly become a man — not simply by being independent or strong on my own, but by learning responsibility, sacrifice, perseverance and trust in God.” With his year coming to a close, Bosco spent the summer organizing and taking part in a “2-by-2 retreat and pilgrimage.” People were divided into pairs of two, given a small map and a destination chosen by chance in Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Hampshire and Maine. Following a sending Mass with the bishop, they traveled to these different places announcing the love of God to anyone they encountered and visiting priests along the way. Once again, Bosco emphasizes the faith and courage that the uncertainty presented by these experiences imbued him. For him, witnessing God provide each day in different ways was an experience unlike any other.

Bosco came away from his year of missionary work with a greater understanding of himself and the world around him. As he sees it, he hadn’t just graduated high school but graduated into adulthood. He learned to approach people and listen to their stories, learned to find joy in suffering and learned to be grateful. Whether it is traveling to small towns in rural New England, working closely with the Hispanic community of Boston or simply speaking with people he chanced to meet, Bosco sums up his experience: “I came back with a greater appreciation for my education and a greater understanding of people and different cultures. For me, the gap year wasn’t a year away from my education. It was a different kind of education.”

Categories: Faith and Service, Nation and World