These few saints, faithful to Lord Kept door open though they could barely afford To pay preacher, utilities and rest They gave from their hearts their very best

To Lord in heaven they knelt in prayer And committed Ward Memorial church to His care He saw their faithfulness and began to bless And increased congregation, I do confess

But sometimes events happen so quickly that it takes our breath away. When things do not go as we planned, tempers flare up, moods become dampened, and we so quickly become irritated - especially if it was caused by last minute permission changes, which could so easily be overruled if only person in authority would take a softer stand.

Yes, it happened to me recently.

My fellow facilitators and I had been conducting a 32-week "Becoming Disciples through Bible Study" program for past year and now we had organized a year-end retreat as a climax of study for participants. It was so very important that we do it right. The retreat schedule was very carefully planned.

The culmination of retreat will end with a mass, where priest will give his blessing for those who wanted to become facilitators for next year and so send forth to do work.

However, this time, it was different from previous years. In our first year, we had retreat at Stella Maris, an old 3-storey building where tables, chairs, sound system, and many other essential items for holding retreat were not in place. I could remember how older participants would have to struggle up staircase while facilitators had to carry tables and chairs up and down stairs. Setting up sound system and OHP was also a struggle for facilitators.

In subsequent years, we had it in one of beach hotels. It was excellent for first time, but cost went up following year and it was not so affordable for many of participants. However, everything went according to plan and hotel staffs were able to accommodate any urgent requests that cropped up.

But other hotel patrons and general public were doing their own thing, organizing their own functions and making noises in and around hotel area! This year, somebody suggested to use a new building that was build on one of church ground. This church is very well-known, large and grand. The church ground is spacious, contains lush greenery, hill slopes, and is so beautiful. For many of us, it was an ideal place for retreats. And it was relatively cheap.

All facilities for retreat were there - single-storey comfortable rooms, spacious function room, sound systems, short distances from our homes, plenty of open spaces for reflection and Taize, and low cost - it seem a perfect place.

But we found out that there were some difficulties too. Some of older participants wanted to attend mass during retreat. This would never have happen if retreat were held away from church grounds. Anyway, this was not a big problem.

Our greatest blow came when we were told by parish priest that we could not have a separate mass at end of retreat and that mass must be held together with parish congregation. The reason - chapel that we had intended to hold mass was not blessed yet.