COR UNUM & NEW STAFF TRAINING

"Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were uneducated, common men, they wondered; and they recognized that they had been with Jesus [...] and when they [Christians] had prayed, the place in which they were gathered together was shaken; and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God with boldness. Now the company of those who believed were of one heart and soul [...] and with great power the apostles gave their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all." - Acts 4

"the company of those who believed were of one heart and soul..."

"one heart..."

"cor unum..."

For the first time ever, at the end of the academic year, but before the start of New Staff Training in Illinois, FOCUS invited all returning missionaries to an event called COR UNUM, where all veteran staff members were able to partake in prayer, discussions, and fellowship in a period of pure debriefing at the end of the year. In hopes of having all missionaries place the struggles of the past year in Our Lord's hands, the 4 day long period of Cor Unum, or "one heart," from May 24th - 27th was a beautiful period of rest before the beginning of our 5 weeks of classes at New Staff Training, complete with daily Mass, about 12 hours of Confessions, several visiting religious orders to offer spiritual direction, and an all important barbecue at the end! :)

Sunday Mass of Cor Unum in Illinois at St. John's Chapel

Br. Xavier, CFR and I at the BBQ. He was in seminary with
Fr. Luke (my real brother) before entering CFR religious life!

Also during Cor Unum, FOCUS announced to all staff that we will be expanding to a total of 74 campuses this coming year, and we received some news from the Vatican about the upcoming Synod on the New Evangelization! Check out the other story I posted about that for more information!

On Monday, May 28th, classes began, and we all got right back into the swing of missionary training out here in Illinois. I can't believe its already been 3 weeks since it started. Right now I'm sitting in our cafeteria at the St. John's Newman Center here at the University of Illinois Champaign-Urbana as I'm writing this, and all around there's missionaries grabbing dinner, studying notes from class, heading to pray, goin' outside for a run, and some are playing some card game I've never seen before... I think it's called "yooker" (but it's spelled "euchre") hahaha, and still others are making phone calls & writing fundraising letters. Just Saturday night in "mish-land."

Also in the cafeteria, and all over our training, there are / have been Sisters of Life, CFRs, Franciscan OFMs, Jesuits, Dominicans from the House of Studies in D.C., Dominican Sisters of Nashville, Apostles of the Interior Life from Rome, countless parish priests, chaplains, and half a dozen other religious orders. Some are here to teach classes, others to hear about 4 hours of confessions everyday, and still others to just offer impromptu spiritual direction for any and all missionaries in need of some advice. 

A regular weekday schedule for us goes something like this:

7:00am - Breakfast

8:00am - Adoration

9:00am - Coffee, coffee, coffee

9:30am - Class until lunch

12:20pm - Lunch and fundraising until classes resume

3:00pm - Class until Mass

5:15pm - Mass

6:00pm - Fundraising

7:00pm - Dinner

8:00pm - Character Formation, Logistical Meetings, or Fundraising

9:00pm - Free time 

12:00am - Most people are in bed by this time...

Weekends tend to be a time of fundraising and character formation events, although occasionally there might be a retreat offered for a select number of missionaries. Character formation and prayer for the students we'll be serving gets a little more intense on the weekends, and in full zeal, the Blessed Sacrament, Fr. John Lager OFM, and the male missionaries made it onto the local news last weekend! Check it out (there'll be a random 10 second commercial before the news video begins): http://illinoishomepage.net/fulltext/?nxd_id=380322

Class topics have included (but are far from limited to): 

• Constructive/Cultural Apologetics
• Philosophy
• Virtue Ethics
• Church History
• Character Formation
• Psychology
• Historical Critical Scripture Study

And it's been amazing to be in class with hundreds of other recent college grads from around the country... If you'd asked me what I thought being a first-world missionary would be like a year ago, I never would have imagined it being this great!

Fr. Kevin Dyer, SJ teaching one of the first "all-staff" classes on campus

Daily Mass at training... usually around 7 concelebrants per Mass...

We've got 2 more weeks to go, and then I'll be on retreat until returning home on July 9th, but until then, PLEASE KEEP US ALL IN YOUR PRAYERS! This mission is impossible without your prayers and support! 

Love and Prayers,

Mark :)