Holy Trinity at the Gathering

We spent much of today in the Interaction Center, fully a half mile of activities, booths, things to do, bumper cars (pedaled, of course), and at one point a parade down the center.  In keeping with the theme of the Gathering — Jesus, Justice, Jazz — there were lots of things to do and learn about justice issues like hunger, poverty, clean water, and the like.  We sent a postcard to Rep. Joe Donnelly to call on him to vote to end hunger; signed postcards to be delivered to President Obama encouraging him to address climate change at the world summit in September; and enjoyed time together.

Then after a *very* late lunch, it was time to shop at the Riverwalk.  Tonight’s Mass Gathering was fantastic — Don Miller, author of Blue Like Jazz; Anne Mahlum, who as a teenager started Back on My Feet, an organization to promote health and recovery of homeless people through running; and a letter to the Gathering from President Obama!  The band tonight was the Katinas, who played a lot of praise and worship songs that the whole superdome sang along with.

Tonight for our reflections we talked about the things we learned today that surprised us — that 40 million American adults are functionally illiterate (that’s 1 in 4); that Louisiana loses a football field’s worth of wetlands every 30 minutes; and more.  But what we talked about most was a sense that we can, and must, do something.  Again our youth said it — “We want to make a difference in the world.”

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