At my parish, St. Bartholomew (1 of 6 parish bases for our Chicago Mercy Missions), we have quite the hodgepodge of missionaries. High school and college girls from Kansas, Colorado, Washington DC, and Chicago along with consecrated women who are based here and in Rhode Island. But we’re having a blast!
Today we started our mission by helping at a crisis pregnancy center and then going door to door to recruit participants for our Kids4Jesus after school “camp”.
…well, the other missionaries did. I had to sit back at the parish with my foot propped up. I was so disappointed to miss out on the opportunity until I snapped out of it. “Maybe Christ just wants me to offer this up.” Duh. I guess this is going to be my lesson from Holy Week.
Well, we had about 30 kids total for K4J and the missionaries were in their element corralling them, playing with them, and teaching them about their faith in a fun way. With my bum ankle, they put me at the station for “story time” which none of the kids wanted to come to because all the other stations looked like so much fun! So I tried to entertain them as best as I could.
At the end of the camp, one of the little girls named Michelle ran in to where the missionaries were eating dinner and said, “I have a surprise for you!” She dragged all 25 of us outside but we were tickled pink when we saw what it was. In blue sidewalk chalk she had drawn about 7 of the missionaries and written their names by each of them.
Next was the Holy Thursday Mass, the Mass where all of us are made present to the very first Mass, Jesus’ Last Supper. The missionaries were asked to help by bringing up the gifts and reset the altar with its usual linen and candles. They also had the chance to have their feet washed.
Right now, they (yes I stayed back again) are all on a bus tour to several churches in the area to visit the places where each parish has reserved the Blessed Sacrament for all-night adoration. Pray the missionaries have a deep experience of Christ’s personal love for them!
