It’s official! I’m headed back to Italy on January 8th, 2008. I am still not fully funded, but I’m close enough. It’s been about 7 months since I’ve been in Italy, and I’m itching to get back! Please continue to be praying for me as that day approaches. I also wanted to send a little update about the 48-hour prayer event that went on in Ancona this last weekend. What exactly is this prayer event all about?! Well, I would encourage you to go to our website, www.goancona.com and read about it for yourself. Here’s some of Jason’s story:

“A Catholic lady named Raimonda came today for an hour and as she came out she marveled at how quickly the time passed. As Anna arrived and went in to replace her I prayed with them. Sandro showed up and joined his wife in the room – and they, too, were encouraged and said the time flew by. I find myself fumbling over how to talk about this with people here, how to explain it, promote it, invite people to it. To a traditionally Catholic mindset, the idea of walking into a church to pray is not foreign – I would venture to say that they make more of a habit of this than most non-Catholics I know. But the idea of a ‘place set apart’ and of signing up for hours and the creative expression all seem to be uncharted waters for most everyone here.”

Another one of the participants said, “the prayer room was an extremely touching experience for me. Entering the prayer room was like entering in a separate world. My hour went by very fast and some time with myself and with God was very meaningful to me. Though I cried for the whole time and felt miserable, ungrateful, weak, ashamed. Sat down on the sofa and kept weeping. I felt I wasn’t worthy enough to be in there where everybody had humbled and open their heart to God, put their pain and worries in the hands of God, sticked their prayer on the wall… I could only asked Him to make my soul lighter and open my heart to His word and to be able to approach life with pure and genuine love for people and life itself.”

Anyway, it sounds like things went really well, and I look forward to participating in the future.

Keep praying for breakthrough in Ancona.