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-Mission Trip to Slovakia January 31 - February 12, 2006
After a long flight, our ChristLife team landed on Thursday 2/1 in the snowy Polish airport in Krakow – the home city of Pope John Paul II. That afternoon, we met up with two young men – Paul and Bohus – at the airport and they drove us three hours to our destination – a Redemptorist monastery in Podolinec, Slovakia. Our first evening we shared dinner with Bohus’ family in a meager apartment. Though there was a language barrier between us and Bohus’ wife and four young children – we had a wonderful time. After spending Friday morning off, we traveled to the High Tatras, which are the mountains you see pictures of Karol Wojtyla hiking in as a young priest. There in the mountains our ChristLife team – Dave, Dianne, and myself – ran a retreat for about 60 young adults from several lay Catholic charismatic communities in Slovakia and Poland. The theme of the retreat was “spending an ordinary day with Jesus.” It proved to be a fruitful series of teachings that challenged all to commit each and every day and activity within in to the Lord Jesus (cf. Eph 5:19). On the second day of the retreat I gave a talk on “solitude” – spending time each day alone with God. Writing in my journal the morning of the talk, I remarked, “Last night and this morning I came to the realization that I have little to offer – I’m trying to encourage prayer and fire… but I feel sometimes I don’t have it. Lord, I am a common clay pot – please fill me this morning with your unfathomable riches – so I may bear you to this wonderful people. Amen.” And He is faithful, the talk went very well – I felt plenty of confidence and God’s peace. Though just a simple lay person from America, God was able to use me in communicating his goodness to the young people in Slovakia. The activity following my talk on solitude was to reflect on God speaking to us through Psalm 23 – “the Lord is my shepherd…” That evening we celebrated mass and the same Scripture was the responsorial Psalm! Further, a young Redemptorist priest came up to me after the mass and said, “that talk was right on, it was not only ‘coincidentally’ the responsorial Psalm but was the verse I received this morning as my penance – I think God is certainly speaking to His Church.” The retreat culminated on Saturday evening with a joyous time of worship, dance and celebration of God’s greatness – it was so encouraging to see the love and joy on the faces of those sixty young adults! After concluding the retreat with holy mass on Sunday morning we traveled back to the monastery in Podolinec. That evening many of the young adults from the retreat helped with the music and prayer for the monthly healing mass and time of adoration which followed. Hundreds of mainly young people crowded the freezing cold, cavernous 17th century church and worshipped Jesus present in the “breaking of the bread” – Eucharist. After Dave gave a wonderful presentation of the Gospel – we resumed in a time of worship, allowing ourselves to be, in the words of John Paul II, “docile to the gifts of the Holy Spirit.” Looking across the crowd you could see, with the eyes of faith, the marvelous work of the Holy Spirit opening hearts to the beauty of Jesus and bringing healing to many others. It was quite a powerful experience! The following week each day we traveled to the medieval town of Levoca in Northeast Slovakia where we hosted day retreats for a total of nearly 1000 students at the Catholic university. Though speaking at a Catholic university, just like here in America, few of the students were truly Christian – followers of Jesus. Each day we delivered the central message of the Gospel, the kergyma, and invited students to actualize the grace of their baptism and confirmation and commit their lives to Jesus Christ. Many of the students shed tears as Dianne gave powerful testimony to her own journey as a prodigal daughter and her awesome rebirth in Christ as an adult. One young woman who was so touched by the talks returned the next two days and happily remarked in broken English that “every since I made commitment to Jesus I have felt such peace!” The transformative effect of the Gospel was evident on her face – so beautiful. Though the aforementioned activites were the major events of my time in Slovakia, there were many small moments of grace in conversations, times of personal prayer, and just in the simple beauty of the Slovakian people. Pictures from many of the events and activites are now available online. Furthermore, I am excited to say that we conducted some really awesome podcast interviews with a missionary priest from Kazakhstan, a young woman who has been a lay missionary in Turkmenistan (only 100 Catholics in the whole country!), and an energetic and passionate Redemptorist priest working for renewal in Slovakia. The podcasts will be released during March and are available at http://christlife.libsyn.com. |
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