Courtesy | Kate Cavanaugh
On Monday night, the Holy Spirit moved in the aisles of Plaster Auditorium.
Students gathered there for an evening of Eucharistic adoration and worship hosted by Catholic Society and Damascus Catholic Mission Campus’s national team, travelling from their campus in Centerburg, Ohio.
Earlier in the semester, sophomore Hannah Cote and I spent a Friday night in Ann Arbor visiting Damascus’s national team and worshipping with them at Christ the King Parish. It wasn’t until afterwards, crammed around a small table at Chili’s, that we learned they would be spending the month of October in Michigan.
Immediately, we both nearly lept out of our chairs, asking and demanding at the same time: “Come to Hillsdale!”
We spent the past summer working at Damascus as missionaries on Catholic Youth Summer Camp’s (CYSC) counseling staff. It didn’t take much time to realize we wanted them to bring their powerful, anointed spirit of revival to campus.
Damascus’s mission is “to awaken, empower, and equip a generation to live the adventure of the Catholic faith through world-class programs and an environment of encounter.” Their mission includes programs such as CYSC, community outreach, and a variety of retreats hosted throughout the academic year. This year, their ministry expanded to include a national team who will continue to travel to different states until May.
In my summer experience at Damascus, I found that their summer programming beautifully balanced the physical and spiritual by inviting the Holy Spirit into high-adventure activities including high ropes courses, ziplining, and paintball, as well as times of Eucharistic adoration, worship, and prayerful small group.
Every missionary at Damascus abides by mindsets of being Jesus-centered, mission-focused, and joy-filled. Asking the experienced, faithful missionaries to come bring their wisdom and gifts to campus was a Holy Spirit-led opportunity to share the beauty of worship they embrace on Damascus’s campus.
Damascus’s Jesus-centered mission invites all souls to deeper intimacy with the person of Jesus. People of different faiths on campus saw the joy of the Lord within them and were attracted to their invitation to the worship night.
“Anytime I step into worship, I’m just in awe of the way I see people love Jesus,” Cote said. “This worship night was solely about adoration of our Lord, and I got to witness that firsthand. Every day I’m falling more in love with Jesus, and I just want all of campus to experience the love we did when we worshipped our God.”
The night wasn’t about bringing charismatic Catholics to campus, though. It was about bringing Catholics on fire for Jesus to campus. It wasn’t about traditional versus charismatic, because the Church is both traditional and charismatic; she is one, holy, catholic and apostolic. We don’t need to decide between being either traditional or charismatic: we are Catholic.
“It just makes such a difference when Christ is physically there with you in the same room,” said junior Alex Dulemba about Eucharistic adoration. “You can talk about a person, but it makes such a difference if that person is in the room with you. I felt like the worship was so much more focused on Jesus.”
The Catholic Society hosted the event, but all of campus was invited. While it can be easy to become caught up in philosophical and theological debates, it was important to us to put debate aside for a time of simply worshipping in community at the feet of Jesus. What compelled Catholics and Protestants to give up their Monday night and spend it in Plaster Auditorium was the one thing every heart longs for: Jesus, our only source of lasting comfort. On Monday night, the Damascus team united us out of love for the same God.
“I didn’t feel unwelcome or anything because I wasn’t Catholic,” junior Greta Dornbirer said. “It was a beautiful time of prayer and reflection. I really felt the Holy Spirit’s presence in the room.”
About 30 minutes into the evening, missionary Christopher Finneman shared a reflection on the meaning of worship with us. He stood below the stage, away from the warmth of lights calling all attention to the altar and monstrance.
“My prayer tonight is that all of the things we know already would come and collide with Jesus,” Finneman said. “I pray that tonight would be an exhale moment for you in the midst of this semester.”
When Finneman first became a missionary at Damascus, he was asked to give a talk about worship itself. When researching words that describe worship, he was deeply impacted by the definition of the word “reverence,” which he discovered means, “a response to the presence of God.”
“A response,” Finneman said. “That healed so much of the tension inside of me, because what I was looking for was, ‘a solemn response,’ and then there was another part of me that was looking for, ‘an exuberant response.’ But it said no such thing. It said, ‘A response.’”
For Finneman, entering in fully to give glory to God ought to be the focus of all attention.
“What matters—the heart of the thing—is extravagance,” Finneman said. “He is worthy of extravagant worship. What matters is that it’s extravagant, and that they’re all in, one hundred percent of the way. It’s not a robotic, halfway thing. Extravagance is the standard. Not the hows, or preferences.”
The evening was a testament to a God who fulfills his promises; he who begins a good work in you will finish it. The night was not a success because of our plans, but rather because we merely said yes to a dream the Lord placed on our hearts to see revival on campus.
We worshipped Monday night for one reason: Jesus is always worthy of our worship.