What a wonderful weekend!  I feel so privileged to have been able to spend time with over 60 students, from 10 different schools across our Diocese together on retreat in Black Mountain.  We had students attend from WCU as participants, but also as student leaders who were able to bring others closer to Christ through their speaking, singing, and the witness of their faith-filled lives.  I feel truly blessed to be your campus minister.

Great things, as always, are happening this week.  Here we go…

Rebecca and Anne Marie are cooking us up a dinner of spaghetti and meatballs, so come hungry!  After dinner, I want to have a brief discussion about student leadership at CCM.  We rely on student leaders to do so much – plan our Wednesday night programs, plan our retreats, lead our small groups, and so much more.  We are already thinking ahead to next semester and who will be able to serve as a peer minister or small group leader.  If you think you are interested (or just wonder about what that might involve) be sure to be at dinner this Wednesday.  Then we'll round off the evening with a fun night of "Catholic Pictionary!"

We have a special event this Thursday called "One Campus One Purpose," which we have helped to organize along with the Wesley Foundation and the Cooperative Student Fellowship.  It will be at Illusions in the UC starting at 7:00pm.  It's an ecumenical event featuring music, prayer, and discussion.  We invite you to take this chance to meet people of different backgrounds, spend time getting to know each other, and fellowship with one another.  I'm encouraging our normal Thursday night small groups to meet at their regular time at 6:30, pray together, and then make their way to Illusions to participate in this event.  Let's represent the Catholic Church well!  

This is our last home football game of the semester!  If you can volunteer for a couple of hours before kick-off to work the parking lot for us, please let me know.

Mass at 7:30pm.  Rosary and Confession 30 minutes before Mass.  Credo this week will be on the Natural Law, which is the foundation for our Catholic moral tradition.  You don't want to miss it, so stick around after Mass and put your thinking caps on!

Mark your calendars for next Thursday.  At 7:00pm, at St. Francis of Assisi parish down in Franklin, special guest Fr. Dwight Longenecker will be speaking.  Fr. Longenecker is a former Anglican priest who is now an ordained Catholic priest, and pastor of Our Lady of the Rosary in Greenville, SC.  He's also married with four children!  Father is the author of many books and has his own Catholic radio program in Greenville.  His talk will be, "Why I am Catholic Today: Being an Intentional Catholic."  I'd like to get a carpool group together from WCU to drive down to hear him.  (St. Francis is only about 30 minutes from campus).  If you are interested, please meet at the Catholic Student Center at 6:15 – and if you can drive people, please let me know.

Just a couple of changes to note:  we have folded our Monday night small group into the Thursday night group.  So now the meeting times and locations are:

TUESDAY: 6:30 at Balsam Lobby

THURSDAY: 6:30 at UC Balcony

THURSDAY (graduate group): 6:30 at Catholic Student Center

NOTE: This week and next we are encouraging our Thursday groups to attend special events in place of their normal meeting.  

We are already starting to look at next semester.  Next week you will receive an invitation to participate in a Doodle poll about when our small group meeting times should be.  Also, if you think you'd like to be a small group leader next semester, please get in touch with me.

That's all for this week – I hope to see you at some of these events, and, as always, God Bless!

Matt

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