Prep Magazine: Finger on the PULSE

Prep Urban Life Service Experience is more than just a service opportunity. It’s about enlightenment.

“If you have come here to help me, you are wasting your time. But if you have come because your liberation is bound up with mine, then let us work together.”

For campus minister Lawrence Molloy, this quote from Aboriginal activist Lilla Watson perfectly sums up Prep Urban Life Service Experience (more commonly referred to as PULSE), one of campus ministry’s signature service opportunities for Prep students.

PULSE is a four-day service experience offered to juniors. About once a month during the school year, a different group of about eight students and two adult chaperones spend four days and three nights in Boston to complete a variety of service experiences that can run the gamut from organizing donations at the Greater Boston Food Bank to serving food at Community Servings in Jamaica Plain, to working with students at Mathers Elementary School or spending time with those with disabilities at United Cerebral Palsy. But PULSE is about so much more than just loading palettes up with food donations or assembling furniture for first grade classrooms. It’s about breaking down barriers and experiencing society through a different lens.

“The overall goal of PULSE is for students come back with a totally different perspective on issues like homelessness, income inequality, and the effects of gentrification,” says Director of Campus Ministry Rob Tyler.

“Service can be fun, but that’s not the goal,” he continues. “It’s not about, ‘I’m in a place of privilege and therefore I’m going to help people who have less than me.’ It’s about breaking down those walls of us and them, and receiving from those we serve as much, if not more, as we may offer to them.”

For Tyler, PULSE helps level the playing field amongst all the things in our society that can divide people: financial status, perceived intellect, or an academic degree. “For these few days,” he says, “we’re all equal.”

The PULSE program began in November of 1995 when campus minister Bruce Pontbriand and English teacher John Moran took six juniors into Boston for a two-and-a-half day retreat. The trip was modeled after urban immersion programs at other Xaverian Brothers Sponsored Schools. Since its inception at St. John’s, the program has evolved and continues to undergo changes. One of the key developments has been its immersive nature.

“When we first did PULSE, the kids went out to eat a lot,” reflects Molloy, former director of campus ministry. “All the food was purchased at restaurants ahead of time. There was an abundance of food. So we looked at the program and said, ‘we’re serving people in soup kitchens and homeless shelters, and we’re coming back and eating like kings. This doesn’t seem to make a lot of sense.’”

Now, each PULSE group—both students and chaperones—operates on a tight budget of no more than $100 for every shared meal of their four-day program. But the limited funds aren’t just meant to act as a challenge. The practice is meant to simulate what a family living under the poverty line experiences in their day-to-day life. According to the United States Census Bureau, approximately 17 percent of Boston’s population qualifies as being in poverty. An even greater subsection experiences food insecurity.

“We try to introduce students to income inequality and discuss how there are so many preconceived notions of why people might be in poverty, and how those notions are often incorrect,” says Tyler. “There are so many circumstances, often outside of people’s control, as to why they’d be living around the poverty line. Students might not realize that people who work full-time jobs still have to go to a soup kitchen for a meal or two a month to help make ends meet.”

“I was surprised by the sheer scale of food insecurity in my area,” says junior Zack Bezanson who attended PULSE back in December. “While I have known personally or known of people who suffer from food insecurity, the amount who live in the Boston area
alone was eye‐opening."

Rooted in faith, community, and reflection, PULSE calls participants to see service not as charity, but as solidarity. When students return from their four days in Boston, they carry with them not just memories of the work they’ve done, but a renewed sense of empathy, humility, and shared purpose. When challenged to confront the realities of inequality and dismantle the false divides between “us” and “them,” students are able to see that true liberation, as Lilla Watson reminds us, comes when we walk forward together.

During their four-day immersion, groups don’t stay in luxurious accommodations either. Early PULSE alumni may remember stays at the Haley House, the Jesuit Urban Center in Boston’s South End, or maybe even the Chinese Pastoral Center. In 2023, the hunt for a new location was underway. Fr. Jim Ronan ’62, the Prep’s chaplain, ran down a lead: the rectory in his parish, St. Francis de Sales, in Charlestown that was rarely used. There was just one problem.

“It was packed to the gills with stuff,” says Molloy. “You had to make pathways through.”

A call was put out to students to help clean up the rectory. But a few students weren’t going to be able to do the job on their own: campus ministry was in need of a team.

“Steve Ruemenapp was the one who said to me, ‘Why don’t you reach out to [Director of Athletics] Jameson Pelkey and see if the football team will help?’ So I did. Mr. Pelkey was all about it.”

If you’re not familiar with the modern era of the St. John’s Prep football program, the varsity team is pretty big. Like, 100 students big. So one summer day, dozens of student-athletes boarded a bus to Charlestown and got to work.

“It was unbelievable,” says Molloy. “It was one of my favorite moments in my time here at St. John’s. The students were like the worker ants you see in an ant farm. They were
going up and down the stairs hauling things out. When we left, the top floor was completely clean. The rooms were empty.”

Despite the herculean effort, the program’s tenure at St. Francis was short-lived due to issues that went beyond cluttered rooms. Now, PULSE groups stay at St. Mary–St. Catherine of Siena parish center about a mile away. Students and two chaperones share one bathroom. The kitchen, while functional, can fit only a few people comfortably. The boys sleep on air mattresses in the big auditorium upstairs. But crucially, the center has space for the group to come together each night to share a meal and pray.

“On Sunday we go to Mass, which we hope contextualizes that this is a faith-centered experience,” says Tyler. “Even if some of our students aren’t participating in PULSE from a spiritual perspective or as an extension of their faith, we try to help them understand that faith is still at the core of why this program exists.”

This lesson comes in different shapes and sizes throughout the experience, such as speaking with members of the clergy. This past April’s PULSE group was joined by alumnus Joe Jasinski ’06, who spoke about his experience as a seminarian at St. John’s Seminary in Boston, specifically the mandatory moments of silence and prayer.

“They are times to learn about God and ourselves from where He is calling us, and also [times to] recognize the importance of good fraternity in that pursuit of holiness,” explains Jasinski to the students over a modest dinner of pasta and sauce. “You guys are seeing the fruits of that at St. John’s Prep, too. When fraternity is lived well, it really does call all of us higher and helps us find out who God’s calling us to be in a lot more profound ways.”

P.S. Ever wonder what a seventh grader is up to these days? Follow along throughout a typical day in the life of St. John’s Prep Middle Schooler.

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