Imagine that you’ve just graduated from college and moved to a city for your first real job. How do you live your faith and find community? Or perhaps you’ve just started a family and want to raise your children around people living the faith. How do you respond to the universal call to holiness? One way, is to join a lay movement or association.

One of the lay groups that best models how a solid foundation in prayer and the Word of God bears fruit in good works is the Community of Sant’ Egidio, which has been praised by the last three popes for its spirituality, ecumenism and service to the poor. 

In college, my best friend, was a member of a Sant’Egidio community. She met for evening prayer every Monday and visited a nursing home in a poor part of town every Friday. The day I broke up with my boyfriend I was depressed and didn’t want to leave my house. I told her not to come over, that I just wanted to be alone. She came over anyway, and after doing my dishes and listening to me talk for a while said, “C’mon let’s go” and took me with her to visit the nursing home. Every part of me just wanted to stay home and watch movies, but doing something kind for someone else, and taking a break from feeling sorry for myself, actually made me feel a lot better. Read More