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• Belfast, ME Team Leader • Started with SPSE in 2021 Please tell us a bit about yourself I grew up Catholic in Belfast, Maine. In college, I joined the Catholic Newman Club and first began learning what Catholics actually believe. It was then, when I was around other Catholics my age who were trying to grow spiritually, that I had the most peace and joy in college. I loved learning about God and felt so at home around people who already had a relationship with Him and loved Him. I say I had a reversion to the Catholic faith, although I never officially left the Church. By the time I started learning what we believe, I had already been living in the ways of the world. Before my reversion, I was looking for anything to fill the God-sized hole in my heart and that meant using things and people to try and fill this deep longing for love that just only grew more and more empty. I wanted to be happy like people on tv or in magazines so I did everything the culture said would make me happy but it only did the opposite and left me feeling lost. I didn't like the person I was becoming, I had a lot of anger and anxiety and pressure to try and be successful in the eyes of the world. In my final year of college my health conditions started getting worse. I got a new blood clot and needed to start seeing specialists because of some new symptoms that the doctors couldn't diagnose. I left college and moved back home where my journey to true healing really began. I wanted my body healed more than anything, but God in His goodness, drew me closer to Him during all those trials and difficulties and He began to heal my heart and my family too. In the darkness of sickness I learned the truth about how much God loves me, not for what I can do, or how I look, or what anybody thinks of me but because I am His daughter and there is nothing that could ever lessen His Love for me. That healing process took years and the grace of the sacraments, but God had something better in store for me than I could have ever dreamed of, or hoped for by myself. I thought that a career in music and having lots of clothes and the perfect relationship would make me successful and happy in this world, but He proved me wrong. He proved to me that all I need is Him and in result my life is truly a new creation. God took those seeds He planted in me at the Catholic Newman Club and then cultivated them in those years at home. It's as if He has taken my heart that was so hurt and broken and replaced it with His very own. Lots of time in adoration and confession over the years, and reading about the lives of the Saints has brought me to where I am today, thanks be to God! I still have many health conditions but God has proved to me that there is nothing that He can't handle and He brings good out of all things! I am here today with a heart full of love and thanksgiving and I am so excited to say yes to God through St. Paul Street Evangelization and let Him do all that He wants to do through me and this ministry! Tell us a little bit about your team We are a new team located in Belfast, Maine and our first outing will be on May 1, 2021, the feast day of St. Joseph the Worker! Right now we are a small team, but hope to be growing soon! What motivates you to evangelize? or What led you to SPSE? It had been on my heart for over two years to join a St. Paul Street Evangelization team, but the two major points that kept me from joining were the fact that there were no teams yet in the state of Maine, and the second was that I thought only certified apologists could be street evangelizers. Those things weren't an obstacle for God though! With the start of covid-19 in 2020, I was filled with a deep longing to share God's love with others, and to inspire the people around me and in my community to have confidence and trust in God's goodness, love and mercy. I began buying prayer cards and miraculous medals, and gave them out and mailed them to as many people as I could. My own reversion was brought about because of the miraculous medal. It pointed me to God when I was dealing with some very scary medical issues, and it was a constant reminder, right next to my heart, that I am loved by God and that Mother Mary loves me too and wants me to love Jesus. More than anything, I wanted everybody in the whole wide world to know that God loves them and that no matter what is happening in the world, God is good and He can and will bring good out of all things. There is always reason for hope, trust and peace because of Him. In this past year my desire to join a street team kept growing and in November of 2020 I saw an opportunity to join a St. Paul Street Evangelization zoom conference and I signed up immediately! It was so life changing that I began giving miraculous medals to my neighbors, the mailman and strangers on the street. That conference inspired me and gave me so much confidence. I finally learned that everybody is called to evangelize as Catholics and that you don't have to have a college degree in apologetics to evangelize, you just need to love God and your neighbor and want to share the love that He has first shared with you, which is so joyful and wonderful to be part of! Since November of 2020 I have been meeting in a small zoom group with a St. Paul Street Senior Missionary Evangelist named Randy Husaynu as well as other budding evangelists I had met in the first zoom conference. In our small group we practice our evangelization skills and come together to support and encourage each other on this journey! I quickly realized that this longing in my heart to join a St. Paul Street team was from God but the fact that there wasn't a team yet in the state of Maine was just God's invitation to give Him my "yes" and trust Him! And, do you know what? He does so much with a yes! I am now the team leader for the first St. Paul Street Team in the state of Maine, right here in Belfast and our first outing is on the feast day of St. Joseph the Worker in the Holy and historic year of St. Joseph! How beauuuutiful!! I can't wait for the people in my community to know that God loves them and wants to have a relationship with them in the Church that He established so that they can have eternal life, joy, peace and happiness with Him forever! And I can't wait to see, inspire and encourage my new team members to shine God's love in the darkness and to use and develop the charisms He has gifted them with to help build up the Kingdom of God! :)

Website: http://dan@stpaulse.com

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