Dear Trung Tay Children, Youths and Young Adults
As we’re counting down to the Midwestern regional gathering 2010, how does each of us feel right now? Are we looking forward to it? What kind of expectation do we have for this gathering? What do we know about this year gathering theme: Magis? The list of questions can go on and on, but one question that each and every one of us may want to start pondering on is What does the gathering mean to us personally? Is the gathering a training workshop about spirituality and CLC way of life? Is the gathering a form of weekend retreat? Or is the gathering a bonding event through a series of fun activities? Maybe, we should look at the following passage from the Acts of the Apostles for an answer to the question: what does the gathering mean to us personally?
“Every day they devoted themselves to meeting together in the temple area and to breaking bread in their homes. They ate their meals with exultation and sincerity of heart, praising God and enjoying favor with all the people. And every day the Lord added to their number those who were being saved.” (Acts, 2:46-47)
The above passage describes the communal life of the first Christian community in the early period of our
Catholic church. The early Christians gathered in their homes to perform the breaking of bread, ate their meals with exultation and sincerity of heart, and praised God. Do these details call to our mind an experience that we have been encountering throughout our faith journey? Isn’t that experience Eucharistic Celebration? Indeed, it is. Dong Hanh-CLC is an apostolic community discerning for mission. Thus communal life is a unique characteristic of the CLC way of life.
Every time when we gather for a fellowship with our local groups every week, every other week, or every month, we, as one Christian community, actually relive the Eucharistic Celebration by sharing the words of God which are the breads of life and giving thanks to God through our sincere prayers.
Dong Hanh Gatherings, regional or national, carry the same meaning, Eucharistic Celebration and invite us to make one step further to celebrate the Eucharist with other people outside our immediate local groups but still from the same ONE community. Dong Hanh Gathering is also an encountering experience for each of us. It is where we will possibly encounter God in a very lively way if we leave our hearts wide-open. We encounter God through mass celebrations, through personal reflection time, through small group faith sharing, through bonding activities with our Dong Hanh companions. We encounter God through the kind acts toward each other, gentle smiles for each other, patience with each other for God is love, as Saint John the apostle said,
and love per Saint Paul is kind and patient, is not rude, and not self-seeking.
How many of us can still remember what we had learned from workshop presentations at previous gatherings? This is not to say that formation materials presented in workshops are not valuable. They are much needed for us to realize the CLC way of life through living experiences. Many of us might not remember the training materials as vividly as we do with the touching stories shared by our Dong Hanh companions, the intimate spiritual conversations we had with our Emmaus companions during the appointment time, the joyful moments when we sang together our favorite songs, or deep movements we experienced in the sacred moments through the Eucharistic Celebration or Taize. Thus, seize this gathering as a precious opportunity and a gift from God for us to seek and encounter God in each person we are about to meet and in every single activity we are about to experience at the gathering. We may experience the constraint of space at the gathering facility, the unpleasant summer heat, the inadequacy of facility amenities etc. Don’t let these hardships keep us from encountering God and enjoying the companionship. Instead, seize these challenges as opportunities to deepen our encountering experiences with God. The Ignatian spirituality invites us to seek God in all things, through joyful and pleasant moments as well as through hardships and challenges. Opportunities exist for each of us to learn something new each time we encounter God and fellowship with one another. When we embrace this spirit in our hearts and strive to live it out at the gathering, we are actually living out Dong Hanh-CLC way of life, a living experience, not dogmatic theory.
Let us together begin preparing ourselves for this gathering by asking God to fill our hearts with a zeal for encountering HIM at the gathering and by contemplating over the following question: How can I encounter God MORE deeply at this upcoming gathering?
May God bring you all to the gathering safely, and we long for a reunion with you soon.
BPVTT-4
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