“Here Begins a New Life” NY Encounter 2025

By Sr. Madeleine Marie, SsEW

Over Presidents’ Day weekend, Sr. Marie Francesca and I made the trek out to New York City for the annual New York Encounter. The Encounter, put on by members of Communion and Liberation (CL), is a three day cultural event filled with conversations and exhibits about everything from pop culture to education, law, and living a fully human life. According to the website, “The Encounter aims to witness the new life and knowledge generated by faith…[in order] to discover, affirm, and offer to everyone truly human expressions of the desire for truth, beauty, and justice.” In the spirit of CL, all of this unfolds within a spirit of true friendship.

This year’s theme was “Here Begins a New Life,” a quote from Dante. All of the presentations incorporated this theme, particularly in asking questions about finding hope in difficult situations such as politics, communication, and science. Each presentation began with the trailer video that focused on different facets of Caravaggio’s Calling of St. Matthew. With every presentation I heard, I understood a new dimension of the video.

I first came across CL in college. For my senior seminar in Theology with Dr. Regis Martin at Franciscan University of Steubenville, we discussed Msgr. Giussani’s The Risk of Education. When I read The Risk of Education, I discovered someone who put into words everything I believed about education, ultimately influencing my decision to pursue graduate studies in French. My French professor, Dr. Timothy Williams, taught French literature and culture from a truly Catholic viewpoint that reflected his own relationship with Christ, and I wanted to do the same.

I met the movement my first year in graduate school. I attended Illinois State University, a school that boasted of its ranking as the ninth most pagan university in the US at the time. Needless to say, I didn’t see eye to eye with my professors and felt constrained by the narrowness of their academic worldviews that excluded any possibility of God or grace. Literature was no longer a source of beauty, but rather an instrument to prove an atheist or Marxist agenda.

One of my friends from Franciscan emailed me out of the blue, telling me how much I would love CL. I thought that ecclesial movements were something that only existed in Europe, so I was shocked to discover that there was a School of Community in Normal, IL, led by Ewa Chrusciel, a Polish graduate student who was working on her PhD in English. 

Through my friendship with Ewa and the other young adults of our broader Chicago CL community, I found the strength to persevere in my studies, not compromising my beliefs and even occasionally challenging my professors to consider how Jesus changes everything. Incidentally, this is how I also discerned my vocation to the Sister Servants because I discovered that Christ was the only source of my joy.

The Encounter gave us the opportunity to reconnect with old friends and to make new ones from around the country and even the world. Sr. Marie Francesca and I met an Indian priest, Fr. Don Bosco Darsi, who told us about his work with organization in his diocese, Talitha Cumi Unnati (TCU). TCU exists to combat the trafficking of girls by providing education, training and support. We also met people from France, Colombia, Mexico, Nicaragua, and, of course, Italy! 

We also spent time with Christine Wohar, a dear friend of our community and president of FrassatiUSA, which promotes the spirituality of the soon-to-be canonized Bl. Pier Giorgio Frassati. We have collaborated with Christine for many years, and we were happy to attend the presentation she took part in on the lives of Bl. Carlo Acutis and  Bl. Pier Giorgio Frassati. Despite these saints being separated by 90 years, it was beautiful to see the similarities in these two young saints who truly witnessed to the joy of a life lived in union with Christ.

The highlight for Sr. Marie Francesca was a panel discussion on the virtue of hope in the works of J.R.R. Tolkien. The room was packed to standing room only, and everybody was moved by a story about how one of the panelists, Michael Drout, discovered hope in the tragedy of losing his son to an overdose.

This quick trip to New York was full of blessings for both of us, and I was happy to have the opportunity to share this weekend with Sr. Marie Francesca!