Her faith grew despite the adversity she faced as she eventually began to embrace the Catholic Church and a celibate lifestyle, much to the dismay of her family and the church of her childhood.
Disowned by her family for running away to avoid an arranged marriage, she lived among the homeless helping others while she built her own faith life. Eventually, her piety and good works led her to be invited to start an Assyrian order of sisters by her bishop in 1995. But the Assyrian Church after several years rejected her because she continued her Catholic practices of praying the rosary and attending daily Mass. With the help of Jesuits, she came to the United States to study in Boston. There, while studying English, she began helping students at Boston University with their faith. She was able at last to join the Catholic Church and was asked by the archbishop of Boston to become the Catholic chaplain at the university. Now Sister Olga of the Eucharist has been invited again to start a new order of sisters, this time by Boston Cardinal Sean O’Malley.
Listening to Sister Olga speak, Carolyn Webster was moved with emotion, reflecting on the good Catholics who let her experience their faith over the years. Webster attended the session with her 18-year-old daughter, Grace, This was the St. Anna’s parishioners’ first Eucharistic Congress.
“I see that suffering gets us to where we need to be to know our true vocation,” she said, reflecting on Sister Olga’s own faith journey. Then she looked up, with tears in her eyes. “Over the years, God has put good Catholics in my life, and I would attend Easter services. Last year, I witnessed a woman being baptized and confirmed in the Catholic Church; she was so joyful. I knew I also wanted to receive the Eucharist—to experience that joy.” She joined the church in April with her teenagers.
Dr. Paul Thigpen
That hunger for the Eucharist was shared by another speaker, Dr. Paul Thigpen, whose own faith journey meant leaving his Protestant faith and a successful career as an evangelist.
“Even as a pastor I knew the power of the Eucharist—I would go into a Catholic church and see (the tabernacle) and know there was a presence. I was haunted by the hidden God,” Thigpen told the crowd. “I tell you that vocations do live in the Eucharist, and I was called to enter into our Lord’s Catholic Church.”
After years of work as a Protestant pastor, Thigpen became a Catholic in 1993. A prolific author and Catholic historian with a doctorate from Emory University, he directs the publishing division of the Coming Home Network International, an apostolate that helps non-Catholic clergy enter the Catholic Church.
Thigpen encouraged others attending the Eucharistic Congress to practice “10 small effective ways to evangelize” and share their faith.
“We have to help plant our faith and cultivate our faith,” he said. Those tips for Catholics to help with that “cultivation,” include: answering a question; recommending a good book; recalling a meaningful experience with God; offering to pray with someone or for someone; and providing an example of integrity to your own faith commitment.
Thigpen added that even doing everything on the list may not produce results. He added, “Be patient. If you plant the seed of faith, someone else will water.”
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Father Robert Barron
Father Robert Barron, founder of “Word on Fire,” a global nonprofit media ministry, also encouraged the crowd to cultivate a very public Catholic faith. But he also reflected on the importance of the Eucharist in that faith in deepening an individual’s own vocation as a Catholic.
“Jesus makes meals so central to his ministry,” Father Barron said, as he recounted the story of the fishes and loaves and the Last Supper. “And you know we are what we eat. … In the Eucharist, we eat and drink the body and blood of Jesus Christ. We conform unto him.”
He challenged the crowd to discover their own mission and vocation in sharing their faith with others.
“How do you allow divine grace to flow through you into the world?” he said to the crowd.
“To fulfill that you need freedom …freedom from your attachments to wealth, pleasure, power and honor. To be detached from these things is to be able to respond freely to God’s will.”