Last November, we had a retreat for young people between eighteen and twenty-five years old. It was a wonderful missionary experience for both the young people and for us missionaries, full of God’s loving care.
I want to highlight its preparation which involved the youth because it is always a great joy to give them the opportunity to transmit their faith to other young people. For example one of the girls who had been attending our schools of Evangelization participated. She prepared the theme of “God the Father” and transmitted it with great courage despite being very shy. It was a deep joy to see how the young people were affected by she had preached and how they prayed afterwards.
The preparation also involved reaching out because we began by inviting young people to participate. This gave us the opportunity to talk to them and to hear about their lives firsthand.
Each talk during the retreat became a living encounter with Christ who wants to get to young people’s hearts on time. We saw how God passed through them during the weekend. It was surprising to witness how Jesus was able to reach them through our poor words and our poor love.
And at the end everyone talked about the fruit of the retreat: One of them had revived the experience of God as Father and decided to take care of their relationship with Him in daily prayer and the Eucharist. Another girl had been very impressed by finding Jesus accompanying her daily life and wanted to find a way to get to know Him more. Another felt the call to talk about Jesus in their everyday environment.
Experiences like these continue to drive us in our evangelizing work
Patricia Willems
