A Terrific Home for Catholic Campers
Greetings from the beautiful Blue Ridge Mountains!
We are traditional North Carolina Christian summer camps, owned and directed by Roman Catholics. While ecumenical in our approach, these camps are terrific homes for Catholic campers. The sacraments are available each Sunday, and occasionally at other times as well; in addition, most of our campers and the majority of our staff are practicing Catholics who provide an inviting and caring presence for our campers. We also have a Catholic devotional chapel on property with the Eucharist present in the tabernacle. Many of the priests who visit our campus to offer mass throughout the summers are also alumni who value and understand the mission of camp and our philosophical approach — some of them even discovered their own faith and vocational calling here.
We hire staff who are serious about their faith. We then surround our campers with other campers and staff who love their faith and walk it out daily. We never want to push or force, but simply provide a focus on the development of human virtue set upon a bedrock of our daily and weekly prayer religious and devotional practice. We recognize that it is the Holy Spirit who ultimately calls and converts; we want to be an environment where that invitation can be heard and responded to. We treat the campers as friends and with respect: in this context, our camp is a place where faith is caught and tends to blossom.
Fr. Dwight Longenecker expresses our philosophy well in his blog “Standing on my Head”
“This is an idea central to a Catholic philosophy of evangelization: that others will ‘catch Christianity’ not so much through overt evangelization efforts (although they are important) but through the personal example and personal contact with individuals for whom the faith is real and vital. Here are Catholics who run a camp that is driven by their love of God, their desire to help form young minds and hearts in the image of Christ and their natural enthusiasm for the life of the Spirit and all of this is expressed not so much in lots of explicit talk of religion, but simply by running a terrific camp in a professional, fun and dynamic way.
This is how the Catholic faith should change the world…
Camps Kahdalea and Chosatonga are just one of so many great apostolates I come across. They inspire and encourage me because I realize that the laity like [The Trufants] are doing things that I as a priest cannot do. …We work together.“
Other Testimonials
“[The Trufants] are providing a wonderful service to families by offering summer camping opportunities to their children. Each year they establish an outstanding summer staff who assist in the development of the young people intellectually, socially, and spiritually. One of our sons was a staff member. He confirmed the excellence of this summer camp from a counselor’s perspective as well as the campers’ perspective from those he assisted. We would recommend the camp very highly.
– Scott and Kimberly Hahn
“A big shout out to the Trufant family for Chosatonga. Our… son went to this camp… and its like, “Where the Wild Things Are” for boys! …There is something about being in nature, being out in the woods, that’s a conversion in its own.“
– Michelle Benzinger, The Abiding Together podcast, S15 E1
“[My time at the camps] was fun and rewarding for me personally, what with… the breathtakingly beautiful scenery of the camp (which is nestled in the foothills of Pisgah National Forest in Western North Carolina)… and the camp staff, especially the warm and wonderful Catholic couple who own and operate it. I should also mention that I had a huge time whitewater rafting with the kids, but that’s a story for another time…”
– Patrick Madrid, Envoy Magazine, Vol 9.4
Learn more about and meet two of our directors, Jeffrey and Adam Trufant, through their interview with Fr. Gregory Pine and Fr. Patrick Briscoe on the Godsplaining Podcast!