by Andrea Martinie Eiler
We enjoyed lovely weather, space, and people during the annual Ohio River Valley gathering of Christian intentional communities. Highlights were multiple prayer and singing times led by various communities, swimming and boating on Lake Gallahue, and the Saturday night intergenerational Contra/Square dance. Our gathering tradition of sharing in multiple roundtables for the clarification of thought had us discussing community struggles, Cop City outside of Atlanta, how to share our resources and infrastructure with the poor, creating an articulated vision for new communities, prayer life in community, and Catholic Worker/hospitality best practices.
Each community and individual pitched in to help with cooking, meal clean up, music, or childcare. And this year we were very blessed by the teens at our gathering (9 total) who did all three sessions of childcare for the 5-10 year olds, played various instruments for worship times, and made and served us Sunday morning breakfast! Their collective attitude of joyful service was an amazing example for all of us.
We counted 81 attendees from 14 communities. We are so blessed by the time of connection, prayer, and play and are already excited to, God willing, do it all again next year!
