We celebrated Thanksgiving after
a flurry of travel in November. Charles
was in the Jacksonville, Florida area November 9 to 15 to visit family and
attend a Christian Brother province meeting.
Brothers from Canada and the United States represented their communities
at the meeting to discuss current issues and reflect on ways to deepen
community life. Charles’ reflection and
commentary gave us a good sense of what happened and food for thought.
Bob was in Philadelphia from the 14th
to the 18th at a gathering of the Catholic Volunteer Network. He reconnected with people he met when
participating in college visits in the past, and got new ideas for recruitment
for the future.
John was at Guadalupe
Regional Middle School in Brownsville, Texas from the 21st to 23rd,
facilitating a faculty retreat on Tuesday.
The theme was: “Making Jesus Real;” reflecting on the Second Coming in
our own daily lives, in the life of school communities, and the importance of
an awareness of that and attention to it.
While there, Matt Wilsey, an ACE volunteer [from Phonecia, NY] in his second year at GRMS, invited John, Br.
Tony Quinn, and Br. Arthur Williams to dinner at the ACE volunteers house where
they were joined by another ACE volunteer and her fiancée as well as two Marist
Brothers. It was a wonderful experience
of hospitality and good fellowship that the ACE volunteers initiated.
We celebrated Thanksgiving Day with
Mass at St. Gabriel the Archangel Church in Pontchartrain Park and in the
afternoon went to dinner at the Presentation Sisters home in the Lakeview area
of New Orleans, just west of City Park.
Sisters from the Congregation of St. Joseph, Holy Faith and Notre Dame
[Toledo, Ohio] communities as well as Dominicans and Presentations from
different federations outnumbered the Brothers ten-to-one! Everyone brought something—we contributed
wine and our unfailing charm. The food
was wonderful, the hospitality warm and the conversation far-reaching and
meaningful. We told our stories, but
also renewed our network of relationships, so important for most of us who came
here since Hurricane Katrina and still strive to help the recovery.
 |
| Sr. Mary Lou Specha, PBVM |
We recently learned that Sr. Mary
Lou Specha, PBVM, the Executive Director of Café Reconcile, where Br. Joe
worked for three years, has decided to resign her post this coming summer. Our relationship to Café Reconcile has been a
constant since we came here, and we will work with Sr. Mary Lou to continue
that important connection to this unique and prophetic work.
This coming week we return to our
regular ministries—John is visiting schools this week including the Academy of
the Sacred Heart on St. Charles Avenue, [Cokie Roberts is an alumna], St.
Charles Catholic in Lacombe, Pope John Paul II in Slidell, and Holy Cross in
Lakeview in New Orleans. These visits
are related to the Discovery Walks program sponsored by the School Leadership
Center here in New Orleans. Charles will
be at Lantern Light Ministries and Bob at Operation Helping Hands, [OHH]. OHH continues to downsize and just last week
another staff member left. Catholic
Charities, the host agency, is continuing other cutbacks, releasing a dozen
employees recently. However, we are
making contacts with Presbyterian and Lutheran community groups, as well as the
Community Center of St. Bernard which is a well-organized and wide ranging
program. We hear that Vancouver College
has made a contact with Camp Restore, a fine Lutheran sponsored program that
Iona College worked with last year.
On Wednesday, we again host
a Taize prayer service at 7:30 PM. We
were delighted with almost 40 participants last time and have hopes!
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