The Uganda Team (L-R)
 Megan Crowe, Kristen Boskill, Melissa Westgeest, Daniel Pettipas, Eloisa Tamondong, Josh Nadeau, André Regnier, Ben Turland

The Journey Begins

The eight of us gathered yesterday from across the country to begin our missionary preparations for Uganda. Each of us arrived with lots of missionary experience, with NET and/or CCO.  As we have quickly discovered, this mission is asking for a greater maturity and willingness to abandon ourselves to the work of the Holy Spirit. It is clear to us that abandonment to God’s will is a necessary disposition to being a missionary.

In our first meeting, each missionary was asked to share how he or she was feeling about the mission before him or her. Our sharing quickly became transparent and real as each of us opened up that we were struggling to be motivated about this mission. We all felt a clear call, but there was little to no excitement. Many of us were struggling in our relationship with God (lack of prayer, sin, doubts), and it was very apparent that we were embarking on this mission very weak and vulnerable. Andre and Melissa, the two CCO staff, were feeling a little uneasy at this time with the apparent rag-tag team they were about to lead!  J The fact that we have all been around for awhile meant we were able to see and accept that this is a good place for us to be at the beginning of this mission trip: weak.

A month ago we received a detailed schedule of the two weeks of training that we will be providing to 35 Ugandan university students.  Each hour was planned out and we were all given sessions that we were responsible to prepare and lead.  Even with this detailed schedule, we all seemed to ask the same questions: “Why are we going to Uganda? What will we be doing?”

However, we are all united now on the “why” which makes the “what” (the detailed training in CCO’s Courageous Catholic program) much more rich and exciting.  The “why” comes down to spiritual multiplication.  We are not doing front-line evangelization (direct sharing of the gospel) but rather we are spending our time and energy with 35 leaders who are, in turn, going out to proclaim Christ to the people in their lives and sphere of influence.  At the end of our time with them it is our hope and commitment to pass on to them a missionary heart; not telling them what they should be doing but who they are as Catholics – MISSIONARY!  With this missionary heart we will be able to assist them in starting and  continuing a Catholic university movement dedicated to evangelization, reaching out to those who have wandered from the faith.

We also recognize and look forward ourselves to being influenced and changed by our encounter with the Ugandan people and their culture. They say “Africa changes you”. We say, “bring it on”!

Please pray that our preparation time in Ottawa would be a time of renewal, clarity and unity