CHRISTLIFE Newsletter January 2001 Dear Brothers and Sisters, For 20 years Pope John Paul II has been echoing in word and deed Christ’s own call to “Go and make disciples.” And even now, the Bishops in the United States call our attention to society’s “widespread hunger [and] quest for a deeply personal experience of God.” What the Spirit of God is asking of us at this time in history is clear: it is the timeless plea of our Savior to make the good news of God’s love known to all and to help them to become disciples who make his love known to others! Jesus is telling us, “look up and see, the fields are ripe for harvest!” (Jn. 4:35) As the Lord Jesus leads His Church into a new season of evangelization and mission, may each of us say yes to His call! May we enter the third millennium depending on the Holy Spirit to show us how to personally respond to Him in daily life. Thank you for your partnership in the work of this ministry! We pray for you! Your brother, Dave Nodar Thanks for your financial Support! Please Pray For This Ministry of Evangelization! Our November financial appeal addressed the reality that we are close to the bottom of the money barrel with enough savings to cover another month and a half. We are very grateful for the response of so many of you. We received close to $18,000 in contributions. While this does not get us out of the hole, it does help to keep us going for the time being! Thank you so much for your generosity! We want you to know that we are not living in fear and anxiety about the financial situation but are praying and making the needs of the ministry known and getting on with the work! Would you please continue to join us in praying for the Lord's provision, and thank you so much for your support! Alpha for Catholics in 2000 was great! Last year alone, over 8,000 people drew closer to Christ through the Alpha for Catholics program we promote. What’s more, we’ve trained 2,000 leaders from 23 states and 37 dioceses -- all of whom will be spreading the good news in their own families, churches and towns. Cardinal Keeler endorses our ministry’s vision On December first, we had a status meeting with Cardinal Keeler. We told him of the exciting opportunities for the coming year. Specifically, we spoke about the two Alpha for Catholics conferences, in addition to the Catholic workshops scheduled at the regular Alpha conferences during 2001. He encouraged us to try to get Alpha going on college campuses -- a very exciting prospect. We also discussed our vision for parish evangelization which uses Alpha as a first step and then leads participants into a process of formation and discipleship in the context of small Christian communities. His Eminence strongly supports this approach and encouraged us to continue developing teaching resources. Our new and improved website is up and running During 2000, our website was visited more than 600,000 times by people eager for God’s truth. Over 40,000 files on the love of God, evangelization, Alpha, and many other topics were tranferred to people in more than 80 countries around the globe, each month! Realizing what a powerful tool the web can be for spreading the gospel, we overhauled our original site. www.christlife.org now allows you to buy various books and videos online, get the latest news on Alpha in your area and elsewhere, and make donations to our ministry all without leaving your favorite chair. Please visit soon and let us know how you like the new site. More new videos expected to be available by March We’ve just received the video masters for our latest series “Catholics Listening to God.” This is excellent teaching by Msgr. Mark Coleridge, an Australian Biblical scholar currently working for the Vatican Secretary of State. Through this series, Msgr. Coleridge teaches us to hear God through the use of Scripture, Tradition and Church teaching. These teachings are recommended for use with small groups, for adult education classes, and those who have recently completed Alpha. Prayer Needs For volunteers for the work of evangelization and mission, including those needed for the apostolate of ChristLife. For the successful taping of our upcoming video series on parenting with David Wells, in the UK. January 19-21 For God’s continued blessing and guidance as we enter the new year & Mil! Calender of Events January 4&5 Alpha Conference Washington, D.C. January 8&9 Alpha Conference Tampa, FL January 29&30 Alpha Conference New Orleans, LA For more information on these events, please visit our website at www.christlife.org, e-mail us at resources@christlife.org, or call us toll-free at (888) 498-8474. Subscribe to our newsletters! If you are interested in receiving these newsletters by mail, please click here. Contributions to help with the cost are appreciated. Newsletter Archives Copyright (c) 2001 ChristLife Catholic Evangelization Services Permission is hereby granted to copy or reprint ChristLife newsletters for personal use, research files, internal circulation, and bulletin inserts. Please include "Copyright (c)2001 ChristLife" and our web address: www.christlife.org. Written permission is required if the article is to be included in a book, or in newspapers or magazines with paid subscriptions. Top