We went to the festival called Taste of Oviedo where we held a booth all day Saturday. We started the morning by giving away lots of rosaries. One woman approached our tent who was not catholic and wanted to get something that would help her faith. Our team found out that she had some medical problems and prayed over her.
We had many children who brought their parents to our tent wanting a colorful rosary. The parents were usually not catholic, so we shared about the rosary along with a pamphlet to pray it together. I talked with a man who came by our tent and was surprised at seeing a catholic street team. He shared with me about his current protestant faith and how he wrestled with the idea of becoming catholic after his brother converted. I was glad I asked him questions to get to know him, because he was well versed in catholic/protestant apologetics. So instead of talking apologetics, I shared with him some of the ways that I came to trust Jesus to lead me down the right path. We talked about conversion of the heart and not just the mind, and I gave him some Catholic Answers books so he could ask and search for questions he had in the future. He was very receptive and left with a few rosaries too.
A woman came by with her two sons to our tent and was happy to see all the materials we had for free. She was a Coptic Christian and wanted to learn about some of the catholic churches in the area. I was moved when both of her sons looked through the medals and rosaries and they were genuinely happy to take things not because they were pretty, but because they exclaimed “all these crosses are free?!” The older boy took a rosary and kissed the cross and asked me to help him look for images of Jesus. I opened up the Litany of Trust card to show him the Divine Mercy image, and he looked with awe and pure love. I almost cried at his beautiful reaction. Him and his little brother both took many medals that they wore around their neck and cards and rosaries.
Overall we gave out over a hundred medals and rosaries and had great conversations.