Lanny Pratt and Catherine are continuing their ministry to Gulf Coast folks who are still struggling to recover from Hurricane Katrina.

Pratt, a Durham resident and member of First Presbyterian, has been working for the Presbytery of South Louisiana since this time last year.

"I do construction and safety management for the volunteers who come to greater New Orleans," he said, "and Catherine ministers to all the sad or lonely hearts that come into our camp."

Pratt, 63, says he and Catherine, a trim 50-pound chow-redbone hound mix, have been hit by "the mission bug." They first went to the area to work with Presbyterian Disaster Assistance, an agency of the Presbyterian Church USA, but haven't been able to leave, he said.

"I've moved out of my home [in Durham], stored all my stuff and put our fate in the hands of the Almighty," Pratt wrote in an e-mail last week.

"Catherine has become a fixture in Luling [the small town outside New Orleans where Pratt is living] and around New Orleans, going with me to inspect homes for gutting and rebuilding. I sing in the choir here and have found wonderful friends in this warm and vibrant community. While I miss First Presbyterian and Durham, this is now so much a part of who I am."

Pratt grew up at First Presbyterian, where he had been a member of its choirs since childhood. He has been in property management, construction and renovation all his life, he said.

The need in New Orleans remains massive and the rebuilding effort is just now beginning, he said, a year and a half after Katrina hit in August of 2005.

He predicts it will take 10 or more years for the area to fully recover.

"We still have thousands of homes left to gut out."

He wrote the e-mail the morning after a wave of tornadoes descended on New Orleans, killing an elderly woman and undoing the repairs made to dozens of homes.

"So sad," he said. "So desperate and yet no one quits. Well, not many do.

"The broken hearts and souls are everywhere. You hear the stories constantly and see the pain in everyone's eyes."

Pratt and Catherine live in a trailer in the backyard of First Union Presbyterian Church in Luling, near a camp where volunteers are housed.

"It's an amazingly cooperative venture, especially for us 'frozen chosen.' Not to brag, because we are only a small part of the vast volunteer faith-based and nonprofits pulling together to raise 'The Big Easy.' "

("Frozen chosen" is a light-hearted way of referring to Presbyterians, who some folks think check their emotions at the church's front door.)

Pratt said it will be the "hands, backs and hearts of volunteers" who continue to respond to the great need that will make the difference along the Gulf Coast.

"I spent a whole life chasing dollars for myself and my family, and it has taken a human calamity to let me see that all of that is just stuff," Pratt wrote. "It really doesn't mean much, balanced against the massive loss that so many have sustained, a lifetime of memories wiped away, loved ones lost, a whole way of life sunk in the mud and debris."