Month: October 2016
Challenging the Kids
Editor’s Note: Missioner Brandon Newland reflects on the past summer in Jamaica and the various activities that he arranged for the kids. The summertime is a wonderful time for students to rejoice and enjoy their freedom from school and homework, but to adults it can be a time to build patience and bonds with the…
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Come Grocery Shopping With Me
Editor’s Note: In order to provide a glimpse into her life in Cochabamba, Bolivia, missioner Catherine Sullivan takes her readers with her on her weekly grocery shopping experience. Every Saturday morning, my site partner Allison and I head out to do our weekly grocery shopping. With a list in hand (along with a price ‘guestimate’…
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Care for Creation at the Beach
Editor’s Note: Missioner Patrick Montine shares how a trip to the beach with some of the kids in Savanna-la-Mar, Jamaica, created a great opportunity for a lesson and experience of care for creation. Usually our summers in Savanna-la-Mar are pretty uneventful and most of our ministry shuts down because we work with kids and the…
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Good Things, God Things
Editor’s Note: Missioner Maeve Gallagher shares how an incident with a friend caused her to reaffirm her decision to be a vessel of love and acceptance on mission. “True enough, the Reverend Billing, when they caught up with him, turned out to be a thief, an adulterer, a libertine, and a zoophilist, but that didn’t…
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I Am Learning to Let Go
Editor’s Note: Missioner-in-training Misty Menis-Kyler shares how her past service experiences at St. Labre Indian Catholic Academy formed and inspired her. Letting go means being willing to allow life to carry you to a new place and maybe even to a deeper, truer version of yourself. I spent the last two years serving the…
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Compassionate Equality
Editor’s Note: Missioner Tom Little reflects on the difficult struggle that often arises between compassion and fairness. Overall, teaching English in my first semester at UAC-Carmen Pampa in Bolivia was a positive experience. That is, except for one incident involving a student, which really tore me up. The university has pretty strict rules in place…
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Lessons from my Hometown
Editor’s Note: Missioner-in-training Anna Klonowski shares a poem about the Native Americans who lived in her hometown and reflects on how learning about other cultures – both near and abroad – has opened her to new experiences. This past Monday, the United States celebrated Indigenous Peoples’ Day, or Columbus Day (a name which many are…
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“So, Where Will You Be Going?”
Editor’s Note: Missioner-in-training Maggie Van Roekel reflects on her time in Formation waiting, discerning, and planning before traveling overseas for mission. For as long as I can remember, I’ve been a meticulous planner. My calendar book is my life-line and I am constantly writing to-do lists, feeling triumphant each time I can cross off a…
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Happy Day
Editor’s note: Missioner-in-training Cindy Mizes reflects on her service at the Jeanne Jugan Residence, where she has formed relationships with the residents. Every Wednesday morning, I take a 30 minute walk from Casa San Salvador through the Catholic University of America campus to the Jeanne Jugan Residence, a long-term care facility for the elderly with limited…
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Free to Have Less
Editor’s Note: Missioner Annemarie Barrett shares how moving towards a simpler lifestyle has positively affected her in physical, spiritual, and emotional ways. I wonder about how complex we make the concept of simple living; I think about how entrenched we have to be in consumerist culture to buy more books to teach us about consuming…
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