CRS Family Gathering

September 16, 2007

Members of Boston area prayer groups gathered in the Espousal Center’s Chapel Hall for a day of praise, teaching and fellowship.

Diane Colgan brought us into the Spirit through a period of praise and worship.

A teaching by Jackie Sitte, RN, that challenged us to fully live God’s call for us to forgive one another followed.

Some of the teaching points were:

• Forgiveness is a process and a choice.
• We need to get over whose fault it is.
• Acceptance and living fully in each day gives us peace and enables us to get rid of the fallacy that we’ll get it perfect.
• Spend time with God to know who he is calling us to be.
• The word “should” expresses someone else’s will for us. We do a lot of things we aren’t called to do or want to do because people say we should do them.

We then watched a video talk by Father Marty Jenco who was held hostage for 19 months in Beirut, Lebanon by Shiite Muslim Extremists. We were touched by his expression of forgiveness for his captors.

After lunch and fellowship we observed a time of Eucharistic adoration and quiet personal prayer.

We closed our day with Mass celebrated by Father’s Michael MacNamara and Robert Lennon.

Our CRS Boston family gathering days are occasions of renewed life in the Spirit for all who attend. They are an opportunity to receive teaching and share the blessings or our loving God with other Spirit filled Catholics.