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December 20, 2016Nobody wanted to be caught standing around outside on the below-freezing streets of New York last Monday night– nobody, that is, except for a handful of missionaries on fire with love and zeal. Our mission: to bring as many people as possible who were wandering the streets of life to a redemptive encounter with Christ’s love. More specifically: to invite everyone we met wandering the streets of Manhattan into Old St. Patrick’s Cathedral to spend a few moments in prayer before the Blessed Sacrament, to light a candle, and to prepare their hearts for Christmas by returning to the Sacrament of Confession.By five o’clock we were on the streets. “There’s no formula for inviting them in,” Steve Oth, a wise and experienced missionary, advised us. “You’ve just got to love them into the church.” And so we did – for three and a half hours, literally hundreds of people were “loved” into Christ’s presence.
The night ended with the celebration of the Eucharist. How fitting: for Christ took on flesh again that Monday night – our flesh – and we became his feet, his hands, his presence to all these people. I guess we brought Christmas early to the Big Apple this year.