Welcome to the fourth 2008 edition of the Communique for the Hamilton, Ontario Diocese Cursillo community. For more information about the Hamilton Diocese Cursillo Movement visit www.4thday.ca.
In this issue:
Well another summer season has gone by quickly and here we are looking at the fall and the upcoming Men’s and Women’s Weekends.
The Men’s Weekend is November 13th 16th – in Deemerton.
The Men’s Weekend team has already started their preparation with team meetings and Martin Saunders from Fergus is the Rector.
As many of you know Vera Vath had accepted the call to be the next Rectora but due to illness she is not able to complete this task. After many attempts to secure another Rectora at this late date, Sandi Farwell offered to step in. The Women’s team meetings have started. Vera is very happy that the weekend will proceed and she sends her prayers.
The Women’s Weekend is October 30th to Nov. 2nd at Mount Mary in Ancaster.
Now we take a look at where we are in approaching that special friend that you have been praying about – We already have a number of applications for the upcoming weekends. I am throwing out a challenge to you. The women are beating the men – how about it guys – don’t wait until the last minute – do it now –
Click here for an application for the upcoming weekends.
Ultreya leaders – Please have printed copies of applications at your Ultreya for convenience of your Cursillistas.
Please consider giving this your attention as the starting dates of the weekends are fast approaching.
Thank you and take care – Joyce Hause – Weekend Co-ordinator
Future meeting dates are:
Marg Weber presented the following rollo at the 2008 Canadian Conference:
Prayer to the Holy Spirit……………
Good Morning… my name is Marg Weber and I lived my Cursillo in l985 and sat with the St. Cecelia’s group.
I am from Waterloo in the Diocese of Hamilton, Ontario. I have been married to Doug for 38 years, we have 2 married daughters, 2 grand children 7 and 5 and 2 more grandbabies on the way. Our son is still enjoying his single status.
I lived my Cursillo in l985 and Cursillo has been a very special part of my faith journey ever since that time. For me coming to these conferences has been a time of great learning about the depth of the Cursillo movement. I get teased all the time about my luck with finding good specials … like a $25.00 seat sale which took me to the conference in New Brunswick and now a 75% off Alaskan cruise sale to get me to the west coast for this conference. Next year the conference will be held 5 minutes from my home so I won’t have to rely on a great deal to get me there. God is good and I feel very blessed when I surrender to Him and he makes things happen for the good. Having just experienced a bit of heaven on the cruise I am very privileged and honored to have been asked to give this presentation about Sponsorship/Being a Sponsor
We all know that Cursillo is based on friendship. Friendship is the key! How many times do we need to be reminded? It is all about Friendship. That’s one of the reasons I like coming to the conference every year. It’s a time to rekindle friendships and make new friends.
Let’s define what Friendship is. Friendship is an in-depth relationship. Friendships should be comfortable and relaxed and requires meeting the needs of both parties. It takes time to build true friendship and there are always risks involved. Friendship requires listening, affirmation, empathy and compassion.
Have you ever noticed that there is certain chemistry with friends; therefore contact with other people is the first stepping stone to grow a friend. Friends cannot grow in a vacuum. Friends can reveal their feelings to each other and most times will feel closest when they are suffering together. When we feel that our friend needs us or when we feel a friend has shared something of great importance to us, then we know that the bond of friendship is becoming stronger.
True friends in Christ look at each other through the eyes of God. This means that we must first be IN God so that we have HIS eyes. True friends love God first and foremost. A true friendship puts God in its center; He is the tie that binds. The friendship must glorify God, serve God, enjoy God and bring us closer to God. I can be friends with my husband, my children and with members of my group reunion. I can be friends with those in the ultreya, I can be friends with my neighbors and co-workers, I can be friends with many people, and the only thing that changes is the level of intimacy. So you see, it is possible to have many friends while not sharing at the same depth with all of them.
A good friend is one who can evangelize by adding the seasoning of Christ’s love to other people’s lives but at the same time being aware of trying too hard. What happens when food is over salted? It tastes horrible. No matter how good our intentions might be, if we come on too strong we could do more harm than good.
People are more likely to be open to God’s love if they first experience his love through us. Our friend needs to discover that God loves them just the way they are, that He is gentle but sincere when inviting them to grow, and that he serves them in their needs. As their friend, we are called to season their lives with this love.
To flavor the lives of others with Jesus’ love, we have to let His light shine in us. We have to be so lit up by Christ that others cannot help but notice. The warm glow of Jesus should be what others see when they look at us. This happens when we love them unconditionally, patiently, full of kindness and caring, while not hiding our relationship with Jesus.
In Cursillo, we hear that we must “Make a Friend, Be a Friend and Bring our friend to Christ”.
As a sponsor, our purpose is to help our friend find Christ for themselves, allowing them the freedom to experience God’s incredible love for them in a manner in which they will see it is possible to live in this love in their normal everyday lives.
God has a place for each person in His plan of building His kingdom. The cross we receive on our weekend, says “Christ is counting on me”, these are very powerful words indeed and if we take those words to heart, sponsoring should be an easy task because we have found the joy of being in friendship with Christ and we will want to share that joy with those He brings across our path.
Just as Christ befriended those who had gone astray, we too must concentrate on those who are far away. Inviting the far away might come as a bit of a surprise to many of you. This concept has not always been clearly understood. Since the beginning, the far away have always been the primary though not the exclusive focus for sponsoring to Cursillo.
Because we are true friends of Christ, we care about those who are not yet enjoying the banquet of his love, and so we invite them to join us, but we must not force them as if we're responsible for their decisions. Sometimes all we can do is be living examples of the blessings that come from friendship with Christ and by being genuine and authentic friends with those who are still on the journey.
Just as we have learned from the topics from the Conversations of Cala Figuera which are the heart of the Charism of Cursillo, what your friend and potential candidate is seeing is that you are convinced, you are sincere and you live what is fundamental for being Christian in the normality of your everyday life. You don’t preach, you live the Gospel with JOY….Jesus, others and you. Cursillo’s purpose is to make Christ present in the world.
When you have been inspired about who to sponsor, how do you begin?
Pray! Pray! Pray! Prayer is the foundation. The power of prayer is immeasurable as you ask God to walk with you and guide you every step of the way in building this friendship and bringing your friend to Christ.
Once we have made the friend, we must be a friend. By helping them accept their own reality and through the way we deal with difficult times in our own lives, we will help them to see that it is possible to find joy in the midst of turmoil. Through making the three encounters, self, Christ and others, they can find the means to deal with life and see it through new eyes.
Cursillo isn’t going to change their circumstances, but will help them realize they are not alone and that it is possible to find joy in the midst of turmoil. Life can still be difficult but we now have a friend in Jesus who is alive and present to us and gives us the strength and courage to persevere. This ability to live with joy and enthusiasm is what convinces our friends.
Don’t be embarrassed to talk about what Cursillo means to you and how it has changed your life. Once you have done this, start encouraging your friend to consider the weekend but all the while praying before speaking to the friend. If Jesus says “Yes” in answer to your prayers, then bring that friend to Christ. Your friend is ready to experience what God has in store for him.
Each of us is called to invite others. How do we do this? Through our words and actions we share what we have to offer. We share what we believe God is offering through us, as His friends through this relationship. If we are authentic and living God’s love in the marketplace of everyday life, and truly being the person God created us to be, people will see Christ living in us and will want to be our friend.
There are 2 good questions you might want to ask your friend:
#1. Do you want to learn how to change to become a better person?
#2. This is a weekend about being Christian, are you interested in learning what that means?
A friend that I sponsored a couple of years ago just happened to be working along side me making sandwiches at the soup kitchen. She was new to our parish and did not know many people in the community. As we were talking, I mentioned that I had just been out for breakfast after having come from Ultreya. She said Ultreya? What’s that? So of course, I proceeded to tell her about ultreya and also what an important role Cursillo plays in my life. Her immediate reaction was: Can I go? When is it? I told her to think about it and I began to pray. It wasn’t long after that I had her signed application in my hands. That was 4 years ago. We are in group reunion together, attend the same Ultreya, and have worked together on weekend teams and School of Leaders. We have become soul mates; we feel comfortable to call each other on the phone if we need a “pick me up pep talk” or power prayers. Our husbands and families also share in this friendship. God worked through me that day, giving me the courage to joyfully and enthusiastically tell her that I had just been at my weekly Ultreya. I didn’t plan it – it just happened. It was God’s plan that we worked side by side that Saturday morning at the soup kitchen.
Weeks ago, after I was asked to do this presentation, I took some time to pray about it. At my group reunion I shared what I had been asked to do and so I asked for prayers for an answer. I was quickly reminded that I had sponsored all 5 women in our group reunion. They have given me their blessing and so here I am on the wings and prayers of my friends in my group reunion.
We are not salesmen for Cursillo – God is. We are the service reps who provide the climate and opportunity for God to make the sale. Cursillo needs sponsors who will follow through with the commitment to the method of Cursillo with their candidate, deepening their own commitment to the Gospel, becoming the Good News themselves and spreading it through Group Reunion and Ultreya. Sponsoring creates a bond. It is hard to describe the special love you feel for someone that you have walked with and were instrumental in bringing them to experience a closer relationship with Jesus. Many times I am reminded how I was an instrument in bringing my friends to a deeper relationship with Christ as a friend, having sponsored them to experience Cursillo.
After being in Mallorca at the Cursillo of Cursillos last November, I was blessed to experience the friendship of the Mallorcan people. Friendship seemed to ooze out of their pores. It was so evident, that these people followed the mentality and essence of the movement as intended by the founder, our beloved Eduardo Bonin. I am quite certain the Mallorcan Cursillistas experience like we do in our everyday lives, the tensions and struggles that happen in our homes and in our own environments. I am sure it is the same right across the world. It is evident that these people are committed to the friendships in their Ultreya; this is where they find their support system. Because of this, they have a need to share it and they feel they have found a treasure that cannot be contained.
I can honestly say that my realm of friends has certainly changed since I first experienced my Cursillo. Most of my friends now are Cursillistas. We meet at the ultreya or in group reunion. We sometimes travel with Cursillistas, some who I have sponsored. We socialize together, we share cottage weekends together. We truly like each other and enjoy each others company when we spend time together. We have a special common bond which is our friend Jesus. My old friends that used to harbor in wild parties and off colored jokes, they have drifted as our common bond is not the same, but I will always continue to keep them in my prayers.
A sponsor must be living out the Gospel in everyday life, at home, at work, or at church, in every aspect of their life, by who they are and how they live. It is the joy of living in friendship with Christ and those who are also His friends that may look attractive to those who are searching. A sponsor’s lived conversion becomes another’s Pre Cursillo.
A sponsor acts only out of friendship and must be willing to follow through in the post Cursillo. It is not a matter of signing up several people for a weekend, just to get numbers up to capacity and fill up the empty spaces. The sponsor must be committed and want to walk with his candidate in the post Cursillo. As a friend he walks beside, not ahead of or behind but as a friend he walks by his side. A true friend does not stop being a friend after the Clausura. This isn’t to say that all those we sponsor will persevere, some may not but it must be a choice they make and not one brought about because they have felt abandoned.
Friendship does not end with the weekend, not on the part of the sponsor or the team.
The team should be aware if the candidate is not going to be supported by their sponsor after the weekend. This is when the team has to be prepared to pick up the pieces and follow up to make sure that the candidate is not deserted out in left field all alone. I have heard that in some movements, the team meets a few times after a weekend. The team from the weekend doesn’t meet with the candidates at this meeting; the team itself meets to talk about each candidate to see how they are doing, if they are in a group, if they are coming to the Ultreya or if there is something that can be done to encourage them. In Mallorca they don’t give the candidates their photo at the weekend; they give it to them at the Ultreya. In this way, if they don’t come, they have an excuse to visit with them and give it to them at that time. The team member will then invite them to the ultreya and any activities going on in their diocese, showing them genuine love and concern.
In Canada, we know that distance is always an issue but the ideal is what is done in Mallorca and this is what we should be trying to model.
I didn’t realize it until just recently, that the team’s work begins with the clausura. I see now that it all makes so much more sense. The candidates have heard the living witnesses of the team in the Rollos during the weekend. They have now become friends and have shared in table groups. So it seems fitting that the team must accept some of the responsibility in the 4th day of the candidate, again encouraging the new friends to practice the method set out for them with enthusiasm and love.
In our movement in the Diocese of Hamilton, before the candidates and sponsors are reunited, a veteran Cursillista will speak to the gathered sponsors, reinforcing and stressing the importance of getting them into group reunion and to attend an ultreya.
The movement needs sponsors who will follow through with the commitment to the method of Cursillo. If this does not happen then the movement will weaken and wither.
It is so very important to set the example of good sponsorship. If the candidate has been given little direction and encouragement from their sponsor there will be a chain reaction of poor sponsorship in the future and with a snowball effect, the whole chain of sponsoring becomes weak.
Let me give you some guidelines for effective sponsorship.
Sometimes our excitement overtakes us and we need to consult with the Lord before asking someone about making a weekend. Pray for your candidate and continue as you await the answer to the invitation. Continue to pray throughout the weekend and beyond into their 4th day.
The sponsor must judge whether this is the best thing for their friend. Cursillo is not the “be all or end all” for everyone. It should never be looked upon as a quick fix for any psychological or emotional issues and should definitely not be looked upon as a “nice” weekend getaway.
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Cursillo is a time for your friend to make the Three Encounters: with self, God and others. This may indeed be a conversion, to the reality of God’s love in Christ.
When your friend has indicated that they want to deepen their life in Christ, then you should feel free to invite them to your ultreya. Ultreya should not however be used as a means to persuade them to attend the weekend.
Then ask yourself this question:
Is the Cursillo method one that this friend can follow in their 4th day?
A Cursillo weekend is the beginning of a new life. A new life of living in friendship with Christ. They must want to live the friendship of the ultreya and group reunion. It cannot be a requirement or an expectation. It has to be that they want it and choose it for themselves to grow in piety, study and actions through the method provided for them. Following the weekend the candidate should go back to their environment and be a better person of what they already are. There is no doubt if the weekend was an opportunity for them to make the Three Encounters, Self, Christ and Others, they will want to be part of a parish, but not necessarily to be involved in ministry. That is a choice they will make if it suits them later.
If your candidate sees that Cursillo has made a wonderful difference in their life, they will be excited about their 4th day as well but only if we as Cursillistas plan and practice our actions so that it becomes second nature. This means reaching out to the faraway, to those who are unaware or distant from God and probably but not always, the Church, just as the 2 brothers in the Gospel, the elder brother was always there but was far away from understanding.
By our witness of the way we live, this will cause the faraway to conclude that we are authentic and we are what we say we are. It is our business to treat each other justly with dignity, equality and with love because we want to, not because we are supposed to! We are Christians who truly believe in Christ and we are proud of it!
I think of my nephew who has been far away because of drug abuse. He is still far away from the Church but I know God is in his life because he told me that it has only been by the power of prayer that he was lifted from the gutters and the street life to some wonderful rehabilitation. He is well on the road to recovery with loving supportive friends in the Narcotics Anonymous program. I will continue to pray for him to return to the Church because he knows we all love him but he has to be convinced that God still loves him despite his past behavior. The day I can sponsor him to experience Cursillo will be a day of great celebration.
Everyone has busy lives and we as sponsors have to be sensitive to our new friends. We can help them to be realistic about what they said they would do in terms of piety, study and action from filling out their service sheet on the weekend. If they feel they need to add much more to their already busy lives, it may be just too overwhelming. We need to encourage them that in time it becomes a way of life.
Through understanding of the importance of the method of Cursillo, they will “want” to attend 4th day activities because they will enjoy the friendships, the learning and the stimulation which comes naturally. As time goes by the depth of friendship, sharing and contagious joy is so nourishing they will not want to miss any part of it. One of the friends in my group reunion has 3 small children, one being a new baby. She never misses group. She always says how much she needs to be with us, she needs our hugs, our love, prayers and friendship. It is so important to her.
She and her family are originally from Bogota, Columbia and they moved to Waterloo after being in the United States for 6 years. She had heard about Cursillo in her parish in the US and when she was deciding on which one of the 4 parishes in Waterloo to settle in, she asked about Cursillo. At my parish, St. Agnes, we have coffee and refreshments after mass in the parish centre one Sunday a month. While there, she was asking different people about Cursillo and someone directed her to me. Well! When she said she wanted to know about the Cursillo. I lit up like a Christmas tree and said, “Come with me… we have to talk!” I invited the family for brunch, and talked to them about Cursillo. She was away from the church for many years until she met her husband. She was really searching for something more. As a result of this friendship, she and her husband both made the following women’s and men’s weekend. She was a few months pregnant at the time of her Cursillo and I have had the honour of being Godmother to their little boy. She tells everyone, if it wasn’t for Cursillo and the friendships she has made here, that she would probably be back in her unsafe war torn country of Columbia. Her favorite line is “God is so good” and thanks God for bringing me on her path.
Love is the best tool that people have to change the world. By learning to love everything and everybody just as Jesus did, we can change the world, one person at a time.
In closing, sponsors need to be authentic, genuine and enthusiastic about how having Jesus as their friend can change their life. I know how He has changed my life.
Sponsors need to be convinced of the method of the Cursillo movement, group reunion and ultreya. Weekly ultreya for me is just part of my weekend, ultreya every Saturday morning and Holy Mass on Sunday.
Sponsors need to be who they say they are and because of their enthusiasm, dedication and spirit of love, the candidate will want a share in what they have seen.
A sponsor must be willing to walk with the candidate in friendship, a friendship that will deepen and grow stronger using the Post Cursillo method.
Since my Cursillo in l985, I am convinced that God loves me unconditionally; I am His friend. His friendship has changed my life.
Sponsoring and bringing friends to experience God’s love fills me with much joy, giving me the enthusiasm to carry on. He is counting on me and I on Him!
DeColores!
Marg Weber, Waterloo
Diocese of Hamilton Ontario
The organizing meeting scheduled for September 20th after the Cursillo Enrichment School of Leaders meeting at St. Josephs in Guelph has been postponed to a later, to be determined, date.
August 23, 2008
My name is Aurora and I made my Cursillo in November 2004; I sat at St. Therese of Liseux’s table.
Over the past few weeks our focus each Saturday has been on dealing with our fear, fear of what might happen next. It seems that often our lives are like a mystery novel filled with suspense. With the suspense is fear and worry. Why are we afraid? Even though we see ourselves as people of faith believing in God’s love and mercy, our humanity deceives us. We let our thoughts dwell on the shadows lurking around the corner anticipating what is going to happen next and meanwhile the joyful events of the moment can get overlooked. It may a smile from your neighbour, a phone call from a friend who wants to share their latest adventure or a child who just wants a hug. Moments such as these are meant to be savoured because they enrich us and lead us towards Jesus. They are the moments of love and worry serves to distract us and lead our thoughts to dark corners of fright and pain without us even knowing it is happening. I have been thinking about this dilemma and it’s a struggle I personally deal with on many days. This topic is obviously on our minds after listening to the talks at Ultreya, and then a couple of weeks ago the Homily at mass was on this very topic as well. Funny, I couldn’t get away from the topic of “being afraid“and it was as though I needed to write this talk on the subject.
The more I pondered it, the more I realized how much our faith is about this very dilemma. My struggle is to accept that we have only some control over what happens next and the only aspect I control completely is how I choose to react. Do I get angry, do I hide, or do I embrace the challenges and opportunities as gifts from God. Now there’s an enigma. In a society where we cherish our freedom and our right to decide and control our destiny, I realized that God says “yep I gave you free will, but not free reign” He’s driving whether I like it or not.
There is one specific scripture passage where Jesus speaks about worry and fear. Matthew Chapter 6, 25 to 34 talks about worry and how we should trust in God’s love for us and the He will provide. This message is so important that it is repeated almost word for word again in Luke 12, 22-31. It must be a very important message for it to be repeated.
A couple of years ago I started paying special attention to one prayer every Sunday at mass, that was when we pray the Our Father and at the end the subject of our anxiety is addressed directly in the segment of the prayer that the priest recites:
“Deliver us Lord from every evil and grant us peace in our day. In your mercy keep us free from sin and protect us from all anxiety as we wait in joyful hope for the coming of our Saviour, Jesus Christ.” When the priest is saying these words I found myself repeating them with him because they are a comfort to me. I have wondered why only the priest speaks these words. After that prayer we say: “For the kingdom, the power and the glory are yours, now and forever. Amen." I haven’t researched the history of exactly how the prayers evolved, but I understand that in a world that has always experienced suffering and turmoil this prayer is very fitting. After all it is God’s kingdom not ours and I have to surrender to it and deal with it.
The question is how do I deal with it? Well certainly not alone. First I see Jesus as the invisible friend who is walking with me everyday whether I acknowledge it or not - He’s there in one form or another - often in a form I take for granted. I’ll explain with a bit of a story about the last 10 years of my life.
Over the past 10 years Peter and I have made a number of significant decisions in our lives that meant we had to take risks. And neither of us are really risk takers. The changes involved making big changes in our jobs. I left a comfy job in Stratford where we lived and took a job in Waterloo and Peter was in Cambridge. Not only that, but I joined a company where I knew little about the business so there was a steep learning curve to get up speed. I look back and it was a big risk because if it didn’t work out I would have been unemployed after giving up 5 weeks vacation, friends, and perceived stability. Although, I knew I had to leave the job in Stratford because there really wasn’t stability working in a manufacturing plant in southern Ontario and I wasn’t happy living with the constant stress to do more and more with less. For 5 years we both drove an hour or more to work each way and the winters presented interesting challenges on the road. I had been only 10 min from work in Stratford for 19 years. As I reflect on this I know it was a leap of faith.
Then after Peter’s mom passed away we decided it was time to move to K/W and live closer to work. We had lived in Stratford and raised our children for 25 years. We were part of a thriving parish, we had friends, a pretty little bungalow, but driving was wearing us out physically and mentally. So we looked for a home and moved to Waterloo. I don’t know how we got through that move and looking back I can’t understand where the energy and stamina came from. Once again it was a leap of faith coming to a new city without friends or family. Our two daughters weren’t happy about being pulled away from their support system of friends and being a bike ride away from wherever they wanted to be. But they loved the house and we thought we had moved into our dream home, only to soon realize that it was the money pit and we were starting to drown. The first sign of things to come was the year after we moved in when they dug the foundation for the house behind us and cut our water line because it was on the wrong side of the lot line.
After 4 years of renovating, repairing and replacing, again we had made a decision and take another leap of faith. We just recently moved to a new home in Kitchener. It seemed as though we had just gotten settled with new friends, a new parish (the 2nd in 3 years), getting to know and love the neighbourhood and now here we are starting over again, well with more experience. While all these changes were happening during the 5 years, our oldest daughter went off to university where she faced many challenges learning to live on her own and not all the decisions she made were what we wanted. And our younger daughter went through struggles with school and boys and friends. I struggled a great deal with my health during this time, mostly stress related.
Well I could be standing here telling you a story about a divorce, severe depression or maybe a tragedy about one of my kids because we weren’t there to be strong for them when they needed us. Instead it’s a happy story of celebrating our 30th wedding anniversary next week, our oldest daughter is engaged to a very nice young man and the younger one, well she is procrastinating along and will figure it out. I can tell you that every step over the past 10 years was a test of our faith. Every leg of the journey has been a test of how willing Peter and I were to walk in God’s plan.
And God has a plan I have no doubt. After the dust literally had settled a couple of weeks after our recent move, I sat and reflected on all the ways God had provided us with love, courage, stamina and wisdom. Each of these gifts came from the people that he put in our path. In Stratford we had been blessed to be part of a vibrant parish where we made friends and we had an incredible support system that helped us to raise our children in a loving and faithful environment. When we moved to Waterloo I feared I would have to be alone because I didn’t know how I would connect with the community. Would my daughters make friends we could trust? We missed our parish so very much. So what did God do? Well on our first visit to church we met Gene who welcomed us and I offered to work on the SVDP committee. At that committee we used to do soup kitchens and that's where I met Marg who invited me to Cursillo and so here I am with so many friends that it’s overwhelming. Over the past 4 years they have been a presence of Jesus in our lives and a source of love, courage and wisdom. I am not afraid that we will have to face any challenge or celebration alone.
My experience with Cursillo has helped me understand that you have to look for opportunities of friendship with every person you meet. In our new neighbourhood we have met only a couple of our neighbours so far. But I can see that there are new friendships to be nurtured and laughter to share. No doubt there will be times of tragedy as well. And I am sure that all my friends in Waterloo will continue to have a place in my life as well. I think I have even convinced Marg of that. So I am trying to look forward with hope and optimism in spite of what darkness may be lurking.
I want to reflect here on one thing; every generation believes that the world has never seen more evil or more death or more destruction. We really think we are special in the 21st century believing that it never could have been as bad as it is today. We forget that today we hear from every corner of the world not just our little piece of it as was the case in past centuries. The media today also has the most freedom of speech than in any other time and political secrets and cover ups rarely go undiscovered. There are no new sins in the 21st century, only greater freedom to speak of them and be aware that they exist. To those who lived in Jerusalem after Christ’s crucifixion: decadence, violence, death and fear were an every day occurrence. There was as much greed and hate lurking and all the so-called modern sins such as abortion, prostitution, substance abuse and adultery were rampant, only no one dared speak of them. No doubt the need to trust in God’s love and mercy was as much a comfort through history as it is today.
So I pray: Lord, in your mercy keep us free from sin and protect us from all anxiety as we wait in joyful hope for the coming of our Saviour, Jesus Christ.” Or in the words of Timon (the weasel) in The Lion King movie as he echoed the words of Matthew, “Don’t worry, be happy!”
Decolores!
Question for reflection: How have the challenges in your life nurtured your faith and brought you closer to knowing Jesus.
Please send me (drmilne@sympatico.ca) any talks you think should be published so we can publish a witness talk every month. Please realize that I will have to use my judgment on whether or not a talk is published so it's possible that not every talk will get published.
One of the things I learned at the Roots and Wings retreat in Guelph is that St. Irenaeus said "the glory of God is the human person fully alive". This phrase has sparked my imagination. What a destiny awaits us - to be the glory of God. Becoming fully alive is something I can work towards. How about you?
De Colores!