Ithaca, NY
Click here to find a team or start one of your own!
This report comes to us from team leader Darren with our Ithaca – Immaculate Conception parish team in NY:
Our team returned to the Apple Festival for another consecutive year this past weekend. This year, the festival changed its layout, sprawling down the Commons all the way to and along Geneva Street. Although this meant closing off our church parking lot (and some chaos for those who were coming to Sunday Mass via car), it gave us the incredible opportunity to set up our street evangelization table right by the steps of our own church and invite festival-goers inside — which certainly bore fruit! We encountered countless people at our table, including:
-A number of young Catholic students from Ithaca College who did not know about our parish, but stepped inside for Eucharistic Adoration during the festival. One of them was even at daily Mass at the parish a few days later!
-A young student from Syracuse University who was in a terrible car accident but walked away unscathed — which she attributed to the St. Christopher medal she had in her glove compartment. She brought her non-Catholic friend to our table, who took an interest in our St. Michael and St. Benedict medals.
-An elderly man who went to a Catholic school for eight years as a child, but had since stopped practicing his faith. He accepted our invitation to step inside the church for a moment of prayer, and when he saw the beauty of our renovations, he said, “I’m going to kneel right over there and pray!”
-A young non-Catholic woman with cancer, who was intrigued by the Rosary and asked us to explain how she could pray it.
-A little girl who had received a Guardian Angel medal from us at a previous festival, and stopped by this year to see what else we were offering.
-An older man who, when we showed him a St. Rita medal and mentioned she was the patron of impossible causes, exclaimed, “Oh, I definitely need her!”
Glory to Jesus Christ for this opportunity this weekend and for all those we encountered and spoke with. Please pray that Jesus may draw them to Him and to His Church, especially through answers to the prayer intentions that they entrusted to us.