Through God's grace, our Ahwatukee team was able to make our first outing on Saturday 5/13/2023, on the memorial of Our Lady of Fatima. Thanks to Mark Porter for joining this team, we were able to setup right outside of the Ahwatukee Iron Wood library for the first time.

We stayed for 2 hours and were able to give away a couple of rosary's and a couple of miraculous  metals. It was a joy to see the smiling faces of those people who received our gifts. It was also great to receive many types and colors of rosary's from the St Paul Street Evangelization store, as part of the team start up kit. The variety of rosary's makes for a great display presentation, and brings joy to people in being able to pick out a unique hand made rosary.

As we were almost ready to leave for the day we were approached by Niles, a Christian that loved to read his Bible, who thanked us for sharing the Good News. He shared with us that many years ago when he was a child, a Catholic priest told him it was a mortal sin to miss Mass on Sunday, and also that no one outside the Catholic Church could be saved. Unfortunately the priest did not explain the 3 conditions necessary to make up a mortal sin, or the many other factors that go into the statement about no salvation outside of the Catholic Church. This truth, though incompletely explained, had bothered Niles for many years. He finally came to the conclusion that the priest had lied to him. We explained to him that the priest did not do a good job of explaining, what he was trying to convey. The gentlemen wore a nice cross and was also an evangelist himself. He gave us a small laminated card that he passes out to evangelize. The card had a poem titled, "For A Brighter Life" by Harold F. Mohn, also it quoted Isaiah 40:8, "The grass withers, the flowers fades, But the word of our God stands forever". He took 2 miraculous metals, one for himself and one for a friend of his. I hope to meet this gentlemen again sometime, to give him a fuller explanation about what the priest said to him many years ago, that he never forgot about.

Also in the first blog, I want to say that I am very thankful for being able to be part of the Tempe, Arizona SPSE team. It was very helpful to be able to learn street evangelization from Sean Kelly and his team. Sean was very supportive and helpful to me in starting this Ahwatukee team, and I am very thankful for his assistance and encouragement.