I have been thinking a lot about what young adult Catholics may need from the church and the experiences of the past few days have been rather enlightening. First of all, I attended the Christopher West presentation in Massena. All I can say is WOW -- for so many reasons. Christopher West is really a prophet of our day. The way he explains and puts the teachings of the Catholic Church would make anyone want to be Catholic or at least think about it. For me, the best line was, “we have always had the right words, but they were put to the wrong music”. How many of us have grown up with the teachings of the Catholic Church, but they never pulled at our heart strings. We have to care about something deeply in order to change or adopt ways that may not always be the easiest to do. This has proven, I think to be a Big, BIG problem with the younger generation of the Church. As a DRE of my parish, I see that the kids are sitting in class, but do the words we teach pull their heart strings, do we teach our faith with the right music; the kind of music that touches the inner core of who they are? How should we know how to do that when we didn’t have the experience? We all have to take a second (or third, fourth, etc) and look at to what music we put our faith to, so that it can touch our inner heart, the place that has the capacity to really fall in love with Jesus. Once we are in love with Jesus, there would be no stopping us in what we would sacrifice for Him, I know that. But the difficult part is getting out of the head, throwing out our Catholic checklist of actions that would make me a good person, and simply love. Love, Love, Love. Sounds so simple. As we all gathered there on Saturday, we found ourselves all in the same boat, and I think, like me, people were awakened to the real hunger that we have for the truth of God’s teaching and I think as we walked out at the end of the day, there was nothing better than to be Catholic. I think so many of us felt fed, but so wanting more. I know I wanted to kidnap Christopher West, bring him to my parish so that everyone could hear this message. I don’t think I was the only one. It was easy to see God working through Chris and us wanting to be somehow connected to that.
So what happens to us when Christopher West goes back home to his family and we go back to ours and to our parishes? How on earth do we get experiences like that to keep us moving and thriving to be our best? How do we continue with that sense that I want to really fall in love with Jesus? How do you “fall in love” with someone you can’t see? How do I experience that burning desire to be one with God? Does anyone have these desires? I think it is about getting real with ourselves and presenting ourselves before God (and really ourselves) naked and humble and scared and vulnerable and we need a place to do that. I want to invite you to that place.
A few months ago, I wish that I could say I was meditating, but really I was sleeping. I had been in that sleep state in which you can kind of think about a problem; though in all respects you would classify yourself as sleeping. My problem was that I didn’t know how to meet the needs of the Young Adult Catholics that were placed in my care. I didn’t even know really how to meet all those around the Diocese who fit into the age category. To say the least I was a bit overwhelmed. And so I went to prayer with the issue and gave it to Jesus, knowing that somehow, He would help me figure it out. That early morning, I heard a voice in my head, telling me to work on a retreat, not a retreat where people would get lost in the crowd, but invite 12 people for 24 hours every 12 weeks to do some serious praying, asking them to be the working force of rebuilding this church. 12 Disciples – 12 young adults, 12 nations that needed to rise again, every 12 weeks. I woke up with a sense that these 12 had to be personally asked to come on this journey, a journey that was just a beginning of something bigger. I woke up with this renewed excitement, and for days following ideas came from everything I touched and saw. I knew that while it was my own voice I heard (no I am not crazy) this came from God. As I began to work on the details, I also came to realize that this was not just another event, it was the culmination of my life, and that it was going to be personal. I think that this is what is scary but necessary. Invitation, invitation. I was also instructed to contact Fr. Al Hauser, my spiritual director when I was at Wadhams Hall. When I explained this experience to Fr. Hauser, he said yes, without hesitation. I knew I was on the right track. And so the Metanoia Retreat was born, and while it is still an infant the first will be held the weekend of November 18th, 2011.
Metanoia, the Greek word for Conversion, is an attempt to put all those words to the right music; to give people an opportunity to hear the music that God is putting into our hearts and support to make a commitment to falling in love with Jesus and with the faith. But in order to do that, we have to strip ourselves down to what God made us, taking away all the “stuff” that we hide behind. The Metanoia Retreat takes 12 people, personally invited, into a place with God that converts their heart, so that their mind can be ready to evangelize to the whole world. We are the lost sheep, and God wants to bring us back to Him, he wants to rejoice in our conversion of heart, in which we come back to his loving arms. We come back because the music and the words come together in such a way that we can’t help but know the joy of being close to God and we can’t hold it back from others.
The retreat will begin on Friday evening at 8pm and go until Saturday evening at 8pm. We want to make sure that those who are working have time to travel to the retreat site, which will be Wadhams Hall in Ogdensburg. Participants have an option to stay a second night if you have traveled far and would rather travel back home on Sunday. The retreat will have prayer, reflection, Adoration, faith sharing, quiet reflection time, among other things. It will be time to get out of the world, get back to your center and hear what God is saying to you.
A person will only be able to make 1 Metanoia retreat, because once your Metanoia has occurred you will move to another group called Manthano, (Greek word meaning “to learn” but is also used as “to learn through experience or discipleship”) the Manthano Group will gather again every 12 weeks for Catholic teaching, fellowship, prayer and worship. The idea of the retreat experience, with both the Metanoia and the Manthano is that Young Adults will have the tools and support to return to their home parish and become a committed leader and full participant of the Church. Quite ambitious for a 24 hour simple retreat, but with God ALL things are possible.
If you stumbled across this, and are interested in being the first of the 12 to be invited, please contact me at 315-323-4989. I would love to give you more information regarding this event.
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