Like most Americans, Lawrence Dorsey, pastor of the Altadena church, was shocked and saddened as the results of Hurricane Katrina unfolded on his television screen. "After the tears and the indignation and the frustration, I said to myself, we have the people and we can do something," Dorsey recalls.

He didn't have to sell the idea. The Black Ministerial Fellowship in Southern California Conference, which Dorsey leads, affirmed Dorsey's plan. Everyone he talked to was ready to start work: members of his congregation, pastors of Adventist churches in the Greater Los Angeles region and pastors of nearby non-Adventist churches.

Sunday and Monday (Labor Day weekend) more than 50 volunteers at the Altadena church collected, sorted and packed perhaps 250,000 pieces of clothing, plus food, baby formula, hygiene kits, water, medical supplies and cash. More materials were being collected at the 54th Street church in Los Angeles and at the Kansas Avenue church in Riverside.

The materials collected in the Los Angeles area were to be shipped to Lone Star Camp in Athens, Texas, while the materials collected in the Southeastern California Conference were to be shipped to a FEMA-affiliated, Adventist Community Services warehouse in Jackson, Miss. The Altadena church was to pay half of the normal charges for a big-rig truck, while the SECC is providing one of their moving vans for materials collected in that conference.

"I know Adventist Community Services is there working," comments Dorsey, "but we had to do what we could to help. The response has been completely spontaneous and worderful to watch."

Some of the hardest workers at the collection center were people who live in the neighborhood, saw the activity, and joined in. One woman, who didn't want to give her name, waited in line to donate a box of clothes and a $100 bill.