In the spring, I teach a sacramental preparation class, which basically means that I get to prepare a handful of my youth to receive God’s graces more fully within His Church. Best job ever!... But seriously, I love every minute of it. For these classes, I go in with an outline of topics and information that needs to be covered based off of the curriculum we use. The first night is groundwork: basic vocabulary. We define words that the Church throws out all the time, but that don’t come up in the average American home, so terms like: grace, sin, sacrament and Trinity.
This past Saturday, several good friends and I ran a race called the Tough Mudder (that's my rear mid back-flip on the right). As you could probably tell from the picture we had a lot of fun, worked hard and got muddy. As I reflected on my experience from that day and on the beginnings of CCFM, and I realized that this race makes an excellent analogy for what the beginnings of many new ministries feel like.