Cursillo

I had my Cursillo experience in September 2001. For those who have never heard of Cursillo, it is one of several renewal movements in Christianity, akin to Emmaus Walk, Tres Dias, and others. It consists of a long weekend (Thursday evening through Sunday) of silence, singing, fellowship, listening, worship, and prayer interspersed with welcome surprises, all of which lead one to consider God's deep, abiding, unconditional love for you, yourself - something you may have forgotten.

My Cursillo weekend changed my life, in an elemental, basic way, because I had never realized that God's love for me was, indeed, unconditional, until that weekend. I also became connected to thousands of others who had attended similar weekends, and became active in the movement itself through my local parish. Most improtant, however, was the small group of individuals who came to form my "reunion" group, who have become dear and abiding friends, as close (if not closer) than family. We meet once a week, but touch base almost daily.

Soon after I returned from Cursillo, I had this dream. I was attending a church party - it was at my own house, situated on the patio and around the pool. Most of us stood around with drinks in our hands, around the pool. Suddenly, people started jumping in the pool - like little children would do, at a pool party. I jumped in, too, and realized that the people who had actually jumped in were my new Cursillo friends. Renewal was, and is, like that for me: It felt like I had been invited to the pool party, and instead of merely attending ("making an appearance"), I actually jumped into the pool.

Like most people, I started my pool experience in the shallow end, where my feet could actually touch the bottom. Eventually, though, one either gets out of the pool, or goes to the deep water at the other end. There's danger in deep water. But that's exactly where my reunion group meets - in the deep. We spend enough time as it is in the shallow end of life, with all it's noise and distraction. But once a week, we go to the deep end together and focus on the moments in our lives when we have felt closest to Christ - as the two who walked with Jesus on the road to Emmaus did when He was made known to them in the breaking of the bread (Luke 24:13-31).

I realize that one doesn't have to attend a Cursillo weekend to become "renewed"; as a matter of fact, some don't need renewal at all. But I did - and I continue to be "renewed" by the ongoing experience, known as "the fourth day".

And every day that goes by, is better than the day before...