Northern Deanery, PA

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This report comes from team leader James with our Northern Deanery team in PA:

While evangelizing during a street fair in a town about 20 miles from my home parish a young woman approached our table. She was accompanied by an older woman who I initially assumed was her mother. She said she was a Catholic but not active, her fiancé was standing off behind her. I asked if he was a Catholic as well. She said no. She said she had a question about the Eucharist. She had read Martin Luther and was trying to understand the Real Presence. After I finished explaining, she commented that she had asked many people and finally understood. I offered her to come to our Faith Study, and to bring her fiancé. At that point the older woman who turned out to be her future mother-in-law blurted out, “My grandson just got baptized”. To which I responded, “That is wonderful, where was he baptized?” She said, “Oh some Church in Bloomsburg”. That is where I am from and we have at least six Christian denominations in our community. “Oh I said I’m from there…(now the Holy Spirit moment …. I have no idea why I added this)…What is your grandson’s name?” She blurted out his name, and Praise be Jesus…he was a catechumen I catechized! The younger woman said, “Wow you don’t know how much that has changed his life… He is totally changed…. where do I sign up for your class?” There was another man with us not from our area. He remarked after they left, “that was amazing! I could feel the Holy Spirit working.”

Small world yes, likely encounter possibly, easy to brush off as dumb luck…. Hardly!

Praised be Jesus Christ!