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SAN ANTONIO • The first annual ACTS Missions convention, held Oct. 12-15 at San Fernando City Centre, offered a look on Oct. 13 at the wide range of communities served by ACTS. Covered in the Nov. 24 issue were the Teen ACTS and Jail ACTS ministries. In this issue, a look is taken at the Ministry of the Third Cross and HIV ACTS.
MINISTRY OF THE THIRD CROSS
Dr. Jorge Cuellar, who had previously worked in probation, came back to it 13 years ago and immediately became aware of the large number of teenagers who, as they turned 16 or 17, were automatically switched into the adult criminal justice system, which treated them in the same “non-coddling” way as any adult in the system.
“You and I know,” said Cuellar, “that that’s a very unrealistic expectation for these young men and women — not to mention their physiological needs, their psychological needs and their spiritual needs.”
He promptly set about networking to establish the Young Offenders Program, which identifies and screens young men 17-25 and young women 17-29, who are on probation, working with them and their families to turn their lives around. Integral to this is a strong spiritual component.
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The Young Offenders Program is part of the Ministry of the Third Cross, whose mission is to provide for the needs of people in the criminal justice system by providing Christian leadership training and mentoring, extended ACTS community support, weekend spiritual experiences and job counseling, as well as individual and family counseling.
At first Cuellar met with resistance from the criminal justice system, but eventually found a Christian judge who was open to the special program for young offenders. They started out with a Christian boot camp, with the young adults in the program being encouraged to attend their parish church. However, when released, they avoided church, feeling they were not wanted there due to their record. Their families often stayed away from church for the same reason.
Sadly, he notes this avoidance due to shame and guilt is still true today. “And this is happening not only in the Catholic Church, but it’s pervasive throughout all the churches,” he said. Then he attended a Teen ACTS retreat with his daughter and realized this would be perfect for the young offenders. Despite being “adults,” they were developmentally delayed due to the trauma and chaos they had grown up with.
As do those attending regular ACTS retreats, the young offenders find the freedom to share and open their hearts, doing so immediately as they feel they have nothing to hide from anyone else since all are there for the same reason. “They’re all searching for acceptance, for compassion,” said Cuellar. “They’re searching for the Lord, for Jesus Christ in their lives.”
The retreats serve as a time of catechesis, as many of the young people are minimal Catholics, having never been involved in the church before.
He admits that this is a “tough retreat,” and some men he has recruited to serve on the retreats drop out. “They’re high maintenance young men,” he says of the young offenders. “They demand a lot of attention and a lot of understanding.”
Sometimes he has had to ask helpers not to return, as was the case with a man who sternly reprimanded their young charges in church for exuberantly dancing in the aisles, they were so filled with the Spirit. Cuellar told the man, “You should have pulled them aside gently with the love of the Lord and told them, ‘This is a sacred space.’ They don’t know about sacred space. They don’t know about reverence.”
John Damon of the Ministry of the Third Cross was introduced as an example of the program’s success. “I first want to thank God, give him the honor and glory for allowing me to talk about this new ministry that we believe was heaven sent,” said Damon.
He noted that between the ages of 18 and 31 he was in and out of trouble with the law, addicted to drugs, abusing alcohol and, in general, an angry young man. “I just didn’t feel there was any hope to stop my life from being like it was,” he said.
A compassionate probation officer introduced him to this ministry and he finally agreed to attend one of their ACTS retreats. Through this, he related, he found compassion, love, hope, mercy and forgiveness. “It is through this ministry that I’ve been able to build a foundation in my life, a solid foundation.” This foundation is built on God and Jesus, he said, instead of the drugs and alcohol that had previously motivated him.
It has also enabled him to reach out to other broken men like he once was. “I’ve walked in their shoes, some of them,” he said, “in the same shoes. What they need and what I need and what everybody in this room needs is Christ’s love,” he added, “and that’s what they build on these retreats.”
A final testimony on the work of the Third Cross was given by Javier Orozco, whose life also was changed by this program and who has now worked with the ministry for seven years. Orozco emphasized the importance of bringing spirituality into the lives of the young men and women whom this ministry serves and instilling a new identity in them. “A lot of them have not been programmed to live life the way we were taught to live life,” he said.
HIV ACTS
Leroy Perez spoke on behalf of HIV ACTS, a ministry for people infected and affected by HIV/AIDS. With this ministry since 2001, Perez noted they have been blessed to have Father Mike Horan and the use of facilities at St. Luke, as the ministry does not have a parish per se, but consists of many people from throughout the city who have shared their gifts and talents to serve as team for the retreats.
Over 300 retreatants have gone through the HIV ACTS ministry, he said, with their 10th retreat taking place this November. He related he has seen persons on this retreat who have been shunned by their family and friends because of the stigma of HIV/AIDS, and it can take years for some family members to admit that their loved one died from AIDS, preferring to say their death was caused by cancer.
He noted entire families can and have attended their retreats, recalling one family who came after losing a family member. “So there’s a lot of healing that goes on,” he said. Special to the HIV ACTS retreats, he said, is the availability of a full medical staff, including doctors and nurses, along with special diet.
The ministry also works with various HIV/AIDS-related agencies, providing ministry through them, as well as visiting those in hospitals or hospice. They see a call to evangelization in the growing number who attend their retreats from out of town and out of state, helping spread the ministry’s good news far beyond the local community.
Whit Rominger, also with this ministry since 2001, echoed the words of an earlier speaker, saying, “The body of Christ has AIDS too.” He noted one of the unique aspects about HIV ACTS retreat is that men and women attend together. This extends to those giving the retreat as well, enabling married couples to experience doing a retreat together.
“We also have day retreats for our community,” he said, “because we don’t have a community in the typical sense where you have a parish involved.” These are held about four times a year.
“We’re at a crossroads,” he said, noting that at this point in time, they are trying to establish a model to be able to spread the HIV ACTS retreats beyond San Antonio, especially to large cities with their higher concentration of AIDS cases
SPECIAL MASS
A liturgy celebrated by Archbishop José H. Gomez was held for the ACTS Missions convention attendees at San Fernando Cathedral. In his homily the archbishop spoke of those in ACTS as sharing in the mission of the church. “We must fight not only religious indifference, but also religious ignorance,” he said, noting many Catholics are confused and do not understand what they believe or why.
He stressed the importance of the new evangelization, describing it as finding new ways to communicate the truths of the faith so people can put them into practice. To this end, he urged those present to help people understand the importance of prayer.
“It is important that in your work of evangelization, you teach the essential and indivisible bond that unites Jesus to his church,” he said, noting “there is a bad tendency today to treat Jesus as if he was only a historical figure, a holy man, but not the son of God.” He noted there is an equally bad tendency to treat the church as a venerable old institution guided by human prejudices and weaknesses.
“Our apostolic mission, our missionary goal,” he said, “is to bring people to Christ and to the church.” He called on those present to be “men and women of faith,” following the example of St. Rafael Guízar y Valencia whose canonization took place that weekend, and to be people “in love with Christ,” willing to do “anything and everything” to be faithful to him. |