Workshop shares ways to cultivate students’ missionary calling

Pictured above, from left: Lisa Miller, Kristie Vollentine, Marian Sister Judy Gomila and Father Wayne Paysse are dedicated to helping the children of the Archdiocese of New Orleans reach out in prayer and sacrifice to their peers across the world. (Photo by Beth Donze)

By BETH DONZE
Clarion Herald

Marianite Sister Judy Gomila will never forget the story – told to her by a fellow religious sister – of a hungry young girl in Burkina Faso who had been standing in a food line for hours. By the time the girl got to the front of the line, all that was left was a single banana.

Sister Judy’s friend watched the child carry the banana “as if it were a treasure chest.” She carefully peeled the banana, divided it in half and gave the two pieces to her younger siblings. The girl kept only the peel for herself, licking the inner lining to get a taste of what remained.

“Tell the people (in the United States) that I see Jesus here every day when actions like that occur,” Sister Judy’s friend urged.

Sister Judy shared the story of the girl’s Christ-like sacrifice with 16 school-based mission coordinators gathered at UNO’s Newman Center for an Aug. 23 workshop on ways to remind students of their baptismal calling to be evangelists. 

The Missionary Childhood Association (MCA), animated by the slogan of “Children Helping Children,” tells young people that they don’t have to travel to a foreign country to be a missionary; they can be missionaries at home by praying for their peers in foreign lands, learning about their cultures and making small sacrifices of time and treasure.

“The purpose (of collecting money for the missions) is to help our children be grateful for what we have – not to be guilty about what we have – and then, out of their own appreciation of praising and thanking God, wanting to give back,” Sister Judy said. “Maybe they would then put a few nickels in a box, but always from a sense of gratitude and appreciation.”

Lisa Miller, MCA coordinator for the Archdiocese of New Orleans, offered some “catchy ways” schools could foster that spirit of gratitude, generosity and fellowship:

• Throughout the year, schools could observe “Mission Mondays” in which prayers said that day would have a mission focus. To make it interesting, different grades could be responsible for writing prayers (or finding prayers online) said for a different area of the world each week.

“Every Monday, people could spend a few minutes praying for that continent,” Miller suggested.

• The school’s Mission Club – or a student ambassador from each grade – could give classroom presentations on the school’s 2023-24 mission country or countries. Ambassadors could also make mission-awareness posters and collect students’ contributions to the MCA’s “Mite Boxes.” A poster, available from the MCA, shows just how far their nickels and pennies go: 25 cents buys a pair of socks in Haiti; 50 cents buys one nutritious meal in Fiji; $20 sends a child to school in Kenya, etc.

• To ensure that religion teachers aren’t the only ones responsible for fostering mission awareness, Miller offered a booklet listing activities teachers of other subjects could use with students during classroom prayer time. For example, science teachers could fold mission awareness into units on climate, geology and natural disasters; math teachers could have students measure how many feet of pennies it would take to make one mile, etc.

• MCA-issued membership cards give youngsters “an awareness that they are part of a national group,” Miller said. She said students could receive their cards at a commitment ceremony, ideally led by a priest or deacon. The card asks bearers to list their baptismal date – not their birthdate – to hammer home the idea that all are called to spread God’s love by virtue of their baptism.

Some upcoming mission-based events were announced at the workshop:

• On Oct. 21, St. Dominic Parish will host the 30th Children’s Mission Day, a Saturday morning of games-based mission education for children in grades 4-7. The gathering, which runs from 9:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m., will begin with Mass celebrated by Father Wayne Paysse, St. Dominic’s pastor and the archdiocesan director of the Pontifical Mission Societies. After Mass, children will convene in the gym to play table games, have a complimentary lunch and sample foods from around the world. Schools are asked to bring posters on the day’s theme of “Hearts on Fire, Feet on the Move” to decorate the gym. Registration for the free event runs through Oct. 6.

• Entries to this year’s Mission Prayer Card Contest will challenge young artists to submit original art on a prayer (provided by the MCA) by a deadline of Nov. 28.

• The MCA’s Recycled Toy Contest, with a theme of “Things in Motion,” will take place in February. Winning toys from participating schools will be displayed at the Mission Office’s 2024 Lenten assemblies, scheduled for March 4-7.

The mission coordinators also exchanged ideas on ways they are cultivating “missionary hearts” in students of  all ages:

• Last year, St. Andrew the Apostle’s Mission Club planned, acted in, filmed and edited a modern-day retelling of the parable of the Good Samaritan to send to school families to launch its winter clothing drive for the homeless.

• St. Thérèse Academy will be devoting its Sept. 18 Family Night to making sandwiches for the homeless. The food will be distributed by the New Orleans Mission.

• At St. Edward the Confessor, students are made aware of the importance of their stewardship by tallying up their missionary donations at the end of each week. Top-contributing classrooms show their pride by hanging a banner in their homeroom emblazoned with the MCA motto of “Children Helping Children.”

• Students at Our Lady of Lourdes in Slidell pray for their peers around the world by taking part in a Living Mission Rosary. Students wear color-coded T-shirts representing the “rosary beads” being prayed for children living in the related continent.

• Immaculate Conception in Marrero offers “Mission Monday” dress-down days to students who give to the missions. In another activity, students who correctly answer trivia questions about the continents are treated to an M&M in that continent’s Mission Rosary color.

• Another school said it was devising another activity: On Mission Mondays, students would be permitted to take off their shoes in class in exchange for a 25-cent donation to the mission jar. The exercise would remind students that some children in the developing world have no shoes.

Kristie Vollentine, the Pontifical Mission Societies’ office manager, has created a full-color guide that fans out to explain the color-coded symbolism of the World Mission Rosary and lists mission-related meditations for all five sets of Mysteries. An audio guide, created by Vollentine and her daughter Bea Vollentine Girard, also is available. To order, or to learn more about how the Mission Office can assist schools and parish schools of religion, call  (504) 527-5774.

Mission presentations are available for use in both school and church settings. The office also keeps a lending library of mission-related videos, books and artifacts.