Marseille Mission Memo
News Update from Max and Prisca Dauner
September 2010
• Download the pdf version of this newsletter (in color, with photos) here.
Streamlining Our Workload
Since our return to France, we have been scrambling to find ways to reduce the unsustainable workload we had assumed after our mission team was reduced from ten to six members in 2008. This was no doubt long overdue, but we could never bring ourselves to abandon any ministry that was bearing fruit; it was like getting rid of one of your own children. Fatigue and prudential wisdom finally won out.
Already in September, we cancelled two events (seniors’ retreat and a marriage seminar), streamlined our youth ministries and downsized our plans for the Christmas program. The process was painful, but did not dampen our enthousiasm for the new church year. On the contrary, we are off to a good, if somewhat belated, start, and are pleased to see record numbers of children at church and in our outreach ministries.
Training Missionary Couples at CEM
For the last few years, our student body has consisted almost exclusively of freshly minted high school graduates. This year, we are welcoming two married couples and two retired ladies. The first couple, Chris and Isabelle Burkholder, have two young daughters, Julia and Chloé, and are attending CEM in preparation to do mission work in Isabelle’s home island of Mauritius, off the coast of eastern Africa. The second couple, Kyle and Katie Von Rueden are preparing for mission work in the west African country of Guinea.
Preaching in Local Parish
Last week, the priest and lay leaders who oversee a local Catholic parish asked if I would accept to preach once a month in their regular worship services. I have taught weekly Bible classes in this parish for several years and know their genuine desire to find common ground in God’s word in order to better communicate the faith to the ocean of secularists around us. They know me and trust me as a teacher of the gospel. Whatever the future holds for this adventure, my goal is the same as when I preach anywhere else: to lead others closer to Christ in order that they might know and love and follow him.