"I see the moon, the moon sees me!"

Hello my friends!

After the final push in 2013 to prepare for extensive counselor recruitment at the FOCUS Student Leadership Summit in Dallas, we passed in to 2014, attended the conference, and now find ourselves preparing full-force for interviews to begin.

Thus far, we have sent applications to 450(!!!) interested college students-- I am excited (and a little overwhelmed) to see how many of those applications will be returned to us by the due date of January 31st. Every time I read an application, I am filled with anticipation for the good that God will bring to Camp Wojtyla through the future counselors, and the ways that they will be challenged, formed, and grow as leaders in both the faith and the outdoors.

Camp is an adventure, and I can't wait to experience it with the next round of counselors to join the Camp Wojtyla family. Please pray for the applicants, for me, and for Camp Wojtyla as we mutually discern throughout the hiring process in the next few months. Without the right group of counselors, Camp Wojtyla cannot fulfill its mission to lead and challenge its campers through adventures in the wilderness in to a transformative relationship with Jesus Christ and His Church! The decisions made in this time have a critical impact on the fruits of the summer.

The team at our SLS booth: Annie and Scott,
Camp Directors, and Keenan and me, missionaries.

Update aside, my initial reason for visiting here is to share a poem I found recently by Blessed John Paul II that perfectly reflects the spiritual truths he encountered in creation. By the light of a full moon, I ascended Green Mountain (mountain is a generous term, more of a hill, overlooking Denver in the Front Range-- but perfect for my still-acclimating lungs and muscles!) a few nights ago with 15 or so young adults from the Denver area, under the guidance of a dear Priest-friend to Camp Wojtyla, Father John Riley.

In 60mph winds, we hiked to the top using the full moon and the twinkling lights from the city below to guide our way, praying a rosary, night prayer from Liturgy of the Hours, and sharing beautiful poems. It was a unique and breathtaking (literally and figuratively) experience, and I drove home to Louisville in contemplative silence; dark mountains silhouetted against the starry sky, the white of the snow reflecting magnificently in the moonlight, my mind still processing the gift of the evening. Here it is:

The Source

The undulating wood slopes down

to the rhythm of mountain streams. . .

If you want to find the source,

you have to go up, against the current,

tear through, seek, don't give up,

you know it must be somewhere here.

Where are you, source? Where are you, source?!

Silence. . .

Stream, stream in the wood,

tell me the secret

of your beginning!

(Silence — why are you silent?

How carefully you have hidden the secret of your beginning.)

Allow me to wet my lips

in spring water,

to feel its freshness,

reviving freshness.

May we be persistent in pursuing the Source, and allow ourselves to be revived by His sweet freshness, His sweet newness. Amen!

With love and
under the Mercy,

Blessed JP II... Pray for Us!