Daughters of the Americas Prayer Breakfast draws 200
John Rieping/The Madera Tribune
About 200 participants eat breakfast and look at silent auction items during a Prayer Breakfast in Holy Spouses Hall on Saturday.
About 200 people ate, listened and prayed this past weekend at the first Prayer Breakfast organized by the local Catholic Daughters of the Americas court.Guest speaker, the Rev. Sergio Perez, spoke on being a missionary disciple.
“We don’t need to be taking classes and need ongoing formation for our entire lives … No. To be a missionary disciple, you just need to love Jesus. You love God and you want to be with him. You have to be excited for the faith. If we’re not excited for our faith, then what are we doing?” explained Perez, whose talk asked listeners to consider how they were being called to serve God.
St. Joachim Court 2553 of the Catholic Daughters of the Americas, the oldest Catholic women’s group in the Americas, presented Saturday’s gathering, which featured a breakfast, talk, silent auction and rosary.
“It was really good,” said 18-year-old Malory Patchell. “I’d heard Father Sergio talk before at youth group retreats and stuff. Some of the things he said it was like I got a flashback to different weekends when he would talk. He was basically bringing the same motivation here that he brought to the youth, and I thought that was really cool. ‘Cause a lot of parents don’t really get to hear what he has to say.”
Her mother, Lovy Patchell, agreed. “I liked it a lot,” she said. “A lot of information. Father Sergio’s talk was really awesome. Evangelization is something that we should (all) do and spread the gospel.”
“It was really inspiring, (especially) that to pray for your family everyday ‘cause you could get graces for them from God,” said Catholic Daughter Felicia Voyles, 20.
Catholic Daughter Jeanne Bryan proposed the idea to the charitable organization “a little over a year ago” after she heard a recording of an archbishop speaking at a prayer breakfast. At the time, the group had no energy to spare for another endeavor, but roughly eight months ago preparations began.
“Everybody kept asking what the theme is and I said, ‘We’ll just put it in God’s hands. He’ll show us the theme. He’ll show us the theme.’ And then (my husband) Jim said, ‘I think he already got the theme. He’s been telling you the whole time: Put it in God’s hands. When are you going to start listening?’ And I was like, ‘Oh yeah. Okay.’ So that is why we put it in God’s hands and just trust that everything was going to be exactly how he wanted it.”
The Prayer Breakfast, which the group hopes to repeat annually, drew attendees from as far as Porterville.
“Hopefully we’ll have this place completely packed next year,” said Bryan, whose husband served as master of ceremonies and one of the musicians for this year’s event.
