 |
|
eMatrimony.org Supporting, Encouraging, and Challenging the WWME Community |
 |
 |
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
| News - International Amazing Stories of Evangelization Bill & Mary Anne Boylan and Fr. Charlie Coulter (Excerpted from the Fall, 1997 Matrimony magazine.) Weekends are Multiplying, 60,000 couples Encountered per year! Dearest Family, At our wonderful convention in San Antonio, good friends Tony & Barbara Zimmerman asked us to please re-tell the stories of evangelization that we shared so that our Matrimony readers could hear the good news. We agree, these stories are worth telling and hearing again! Fr. Charlie We would like to begin by recalling a familiar Gospel story. It's a story that is told on every Weekend presented around the world. It's the story of the sower who plants seeds in different kinds of soil...some good, some not so good. On our Weekend, we heard that story as a challenge to become better listeners. Today, let's hear the story in a new way. This time we are the sowers...and we invite you to come with us into the lands where Marriage Encounter is sowing the good seeds of love and relationship. Couples like yourselves, in many countries have taken the story of the sower seriously. Like the sower, you don't give up because there are bare patches. Couples and priests continue to share the good news in the 83 countries where the WWME Weekend is presented around the world. In Europe this year [1997] we are celebrating the 25th anniversary of the arrival of WWME. It was brought from the United States by generous couples and priests who shared the good news. Now 18 European countries have active ME communities and our Weekend is given in 9 different languages. Countries formerly under the Soviet Union have opened up to our Weekend. Despite the differences in culture and history, all couples have the same yearning for a deepening of their relationship. These new communities of Eastern Europe face great struggles. Communication is extremely difficult because most people have no car, no telephone, inefficient mail service, no place to meet and very little money. In many of these newly freed countries, couples need all of their energies just to survive. But there is vitality and a missionary outreach for the Weekend. For example, despite the difficult situation in Yugoslavia, couples there helped to bring the Weekend to Italy. In Hungary, when people were forbidden to gather, the first Weekend was given secretly in two private apartments. Right now, to get on a Weekend in Budapest, there is a waiting list of about 18 months. Hungary has also reached out to bring the Weekend to Russia for Hungarian-speaking couples. Let's move now to Latin America where communication is easier because the 19 countries share similar languages and similar customs. Over 60,000 couples made our Weekend in the last two years in Latin America. There is great enthusiasm and we have new, young leaders in almost all of the 19 countries. There are indeed great problems facing couples. In many places there is great poverty terrorism and violence. Despite these horrendous obstacles, recruiting for the Weekend gives us great hope. When we were in Argentina we discovered that couples have to wait up to two years to go on a Weekend. During that waiting time the couples are each assigned a guia, or angel couple to support and prepare them for their Weekend and for belonging to the M.E. community. In one of the barriadas on the outskirts of Santiago, Chile, we met a group of four ME couples and a priest who take on extra jobs such as painting, cleaning and baby sitting, in order to make money to send an-other poor couple on a Weekend. MaryAnne The sowers of the seeds of our Weekend in Africa don't give up either. Although in most African countries the cost of the Weekend is half a month's salary! In Zimbabwe, a nun stepped way out of her comfort zone and challenged her parish council colleagues. "We say we are here to encourage the health of our parish; still we look the other way as couples separate and divorce right in front of our eyes" Thus, the door was opened and Marriage Encounter entered Zimbabwe. Pat & Dawn and Fr. Louis wrote us at Easter and said their April,1997 Weekend was full, with couples on a waiting list. Such a great problem! Right now, 26 recently Encountered couples are being sent forth to help spread the Weekend in all parts of Zimbabwe. In the Pacific Secretariat, Fr. Mike McVerry's zeal, combined with Lusia & Talemo's gentleness, has created villages of Encountered people in Fiji. They go around in a boat to pick up the various couples on Friday night and bring them to the facility where the Weekend is held. Also, as they stop at each point, couples already Encountered donate the food which will be used on the Weekend. Fiji dreamed a dream along with Tonga - to reach out to bring the Weekend to the Solomon Islands. In 17 days, the first five Weekends were held in the Solomons. Three were presented on weekend dates, and two were held midweek. In 17 days, 108 couples, 3 bishops, 7 priests and 11 nuns made the Weekend! The presenting couples were farmers, who traveled to the Solomons and stayed for 2½ months. Back home, their local M.E. communities cared for their children, planted and watched over their crops. The opportunity for planting many of these seeds came about because of the generosity of the United States of America. The Sunday collection from the 1995 Denver Convention - a gift from all of you, and from the caring leadership of Dennis, Alynn and Fr. Rich - was used for many, many reachouts around the world. Africa, the Pacific and Latin America endure great and constant financial adversity. I worry some-times "will the United States tire of giving or start feeling taken advantage of? It is only human" But you touch me so because you resist those human feelings. Right now you are putting Africa on their feet after the death of their leadership husband Neale O'Connor. You are making sure Latin America and the Pacific are angeled. Asia is using the Denver Convention outlines at their big gathering this August. Precious and beloved family, please experience your own goodness. You love and faith and evangelization in action. When you arrive in heaven, do not be surprised as couples and priests from Chile, Madagascar. New Zealand and Bangladesh come and tap you on the shoulder and say. "You don't know me, but I know you. You cared about the future of Worldwide Marriage Encounter in my country. You sent to us your love, your finances and your prayers." Bill I get to tell you about what's happening with our neighbors to the North, Canada, and also about the enthusiasm and progress of the Weekend taking place in Asia. When we asked the leaders of Canada to tell us about the stories of Expansion in Canada, they said, "We wish we could share stories like the Solomon Islands or Bulgaria or Cameroon, but our stories are about bringing the Encounter back to places where it has been dormant in our country" Fr. Walter of Montréal took responsibility for having an English speaking Weekend in Montréal. It had been six years since a Weekend was presented there. Joe & Mary moved into Burlington and found no Marriage Encounter support community. They got busy in their parish, recruited couples, gave a Weekend, and now have several communities active in their town. Fr. Steve was assigned to a new parish and before he got his bags unpacked, he had recruited enough couples for a Weekend and the start of an active community. The Hispanic community in Toronto has brought the Weekend to the London and the Guelph areas of Ontario. The first Weekend in about 15 years was held in Kingston in April. The Bishop made a commitment to underwrite any monetary shortfalls for the Weekend. It wasn't necessary. They also told us `By the way, we are in touch with Bishop Rouleau of Churchill, Manitoba. The Bishop is Encountered and gave Weekends in Quebec. They are getting their cold weather gear on and are getting ready to open the Northwest Territories to the Weekend. In Asia, India, Indonesia, Korea, Japan, Singapore, Malaysia, Philippines and Sri Lanka have all within a year or so of each other celebrated their 20th anniversary of WWME in their country. They speak in awe of the missionary zeal of couples and priests from the West who have made it possible. Today the missionary zeal continues, but from within Asia. The Korean Bishop of the Pusan Diocese recently told his diocesan priests, all 400 of them, that they should each experience a Cursillo and a Marriage Encounter Weekend. His vicar general serves as the executive priest with the WWME national team for Korea. In South Korea, Catholics are only 9% of the 44 million population. There are 14 dioceses with many, many parishes. Every single parish has at least one Marriage Encounter sharing community. There are 135 Weekends per year in South Korea, with an average of 26 couples per Weekend. Couples sometimes have to wait up to two years to attend. Recently, in India, some teams had arranged to give a Weekend in a very remote tribal area. Just before the Weekend, the army put a curfew on travel. When the team arrived, there were five sisters assembled for the Weekend. The Weekend was held anyhow. The army should know better than to mess with the good nuns! Watch them spread the Weekend. Marriage Encounter Asia is now looking for a chance to give Weekends in mainland China. Missionary activity by non-Chinese is absolutely forbidden. So Asian leadership is trying to start by sending a team into northeast China where there is a large Korean ethnic population. They also have a Chinese language branch of Marriage Encounter in Singapore and they may ask the Chinese government permission to send them. There are stories from Malaysia and Bangladesh which there isn't room for, but please know that this Movement that we belong to is alive and well and doing its best to change the world. Did you know... · Worldwide Marriage Encounter is the largest, most effective
pro-marriage movement in the world. All of this is accomplished by an all-volunteer army of lovers like you. Many a Fortune 500 company would like to have an organization made up of people like you. Be proud of who you are and continue to spread the good news of relationship in Christ wherever you go. Love Click here for a printable page (PDF, 24KB)
|