Hey there! My name is Kate DiLeo and I’m from Minneapolis, Minnesota. Although I was born in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, I’ve called Minnesota my home for practically my entire life. I’m 23 years old and a graduate of the University of Minnesota with degrees in Cultural Anthropology and Spanish Studies. You are probably thinking, “wow…she didn’t venture far from home for college or much else, did she?” At first glance, your assumption might be correct. However, travel has been a huge part of my life since I was a little girl.
I was raised in a family where travel was important because my parents have always believed that it expands one’s understanding of the world, and ultimately him/herself. My most memorable travel experiences were while studying abroad in Toledo, Spain in 2006. I spent a semester in Toledo studying Spanish and it was the most enjoying experience I’ve ever had! After my semester ended, I had the opportunity to backpack through Europe for a month with a friend from my program. We hit over 14 cities in one month and it was during that trip that I fell in love with the lifestyle of backpacking. If you’ve never done it, let me tell you, it’s a lifestyle shift when you become accustomed to hand washing clothes in hostel sinks, eating cans of tuna and apples for sustenance, and being poor enough to walk all of Paris rather than spend a few bucks on the subway.
Needless to say, I was in love: with travel and with the world! I came home and spent two years finishing my degree and working full time. Shockingly enough, it was only three months after I came home from Europe that I began a personal walk with Jesus. Sure, I grew up Catholic and knew God in my head, knew He was there and that He loved me, but I didn’t understand the concepts of dependence and reverence for God. However, it was September 2006 when I had a breakdown moment that changed my life. I was so desperate, so alone, so wanting and needing to feel loved that I finally threw my hands in the air and said, “I know I’m supposed to read my bible and love God, but I don’t want to! If God is real and He wants me to love Him, then He is going to have to fix it! I’m done trying!”….Three weeks later I was at a young adults group and beginning the baby steps of walking with Jesus. That full-surrender moment was so beautiful, so raw, and I’m so thankful that through everything I went through in my past, God had enough grace and love to bring me to the point where I gave up and let Him take me where He wanted me to be: In His arms.
So…how did I find the World Race and why did I choose this trip? Well, as you can see, I love travel. Most importantly, I love God. These two years of walking with God have been the hardest and most rewarding years of my life. I had to lay down my plans, my desires, my passions and talents, and let Him work on things in my heart that I didn’t even know were there. It was two years of walking through the wilderness, two years of painful tears and triumphant victories through Christ! And through all of this, God has somehow brought me back to the deepest passions of my heart, which are travel and serving others. In the past, travel had always been about me and what I wanted to see. I was a typical tourist caught up in the grand scheme of sight-seeing without any real purpose. However, soon after I surrendered my life to Christ, I heard the Lord speak to my heart: “You will travel again, but never for your own purposes. You will not leave this country again unless it is for My glory!” I have kept to that command and so The World Race is the first opportunity I have seen where I can travel around the world with the singular purpose of giving others the love of Jesus Christ.
I’m so excited for this opportunity to be with every single teammate and to see how God is going to change us all! I know that each of us will be so different. As for me, I’m a quirky and bold person who thrives in high-energy environments. I love to make people laugh more than anything and seeing others experience freedom through laughter. I talk. A lot. I won’t lie to you. I really do talk a lot. However, even beyond those bold and outgoing qualities, I have my quiet times too. You can ask my best friend and she will tell you that I love music, writing, singing, and being quiet for hours on end. I will sit at a coffee shop and people watch for hours and would be perfectly content sitting in my room by myself doing an art project. I am a leader yet truly love others who can take the lead and show me new things. I’ve learned the fine balance of simultaneously setting my outrageous plans in the hands of God while taking it day to day. I am not perfect, not a walking dictionary of Bible stories or revelations, but I am God’s child. I’m continually broken, humbled, lifted up, and redeemed by His love. This whole Christian thing is one big messy business, and I wouldn’t have it any other way! There is such peace in letting God change the deepest parts of me. Sometimes it’s the letting go of who I think I am that reveals who I am truly made to be: an Image of Christ. And so that’s it. I can’t even try to tell you any more about who I am because I know all of it will fall to the wayside once I embark on this 11 month journey with the rest of my fabulous team. Maybe at the end of it all I will come just a fragment closer to knowing who I am through Christ. I certainly hope so…
