By Suzanne Haugh, Staff Writer

COLLEGE PARK—They called it the multiplication of the lunches—and it couldn’t have fit more perfectly with the day’s script.

Organizers of the children’s track at the Corpus Christi celebration responded quickly to the tremendous number of children that came to register, estimated to be about 100 more than the pre-registered 430. Children from pre-K to 4th or 5th grade learned firsthand about Jesus’ miracle of feeding a crowd, estimated in the thousands, with five loaves and two fish.

“Here we were talking about how Jesus multiplied the loaves and the fishes and we didn’t even know there were not enough lunches,” said Mary Lou Gamache, the organizer and a parishioner at St. Catherine of Siena Church, Kennesaw.

Volunteers broke open plastic containers, halving peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, chips and a cookie.

“The kids were fine with that and we even had a few lunches where we divided what was left. Everyone was fed.”

When Gamache looked out over the “sea of kids . . . packed in like sardines,” she wondered what she had gotten herself into months earlier when asked to spearhead the track. She credited some of the track’s success to the main catechist, Cathie Riola, who “was like a rock.”

Volunteer teachers were assigned to tables of 10 kids so that each child would feel safe amid the great number of participants. Gamache credited the volunteers for being flexible and “full of grace.”

“The pressure at registration was intense,” but she felt assured of the comprehensive program that centered on the life of Christ and included games, crafts, music and storytelling.

“I told the volunteers beforehand that what they really needed was to be Christ to the kids—his hands, his feet, his attitude,” said Gamache, who revealed that some volunteers skipped lunch so that the children could eat. Volunteers also bypassed the opportunity to hear acclaimed speakers in order to serve the children.

“Some people never got a lick of anything, but they did it out of love for Christ. There were no egos, even people in line, maybe there were one or two oinky ones, but most were patient . . . The volunteers really had the grace to be Christ to these kids.”

The session started with a gathering activity where children drew, cut out and glued a self-portrait on the cover of a folder, with the lesson being that each one of them was special and that they were uniquely created by God, Gamache said. They followed this up with a cheer: “Our God is dynamite!”

“To hear 500 children yelling this out would have given you shivers. The kids were having a good time.”

Because of the large number, Gamache had to scale down the activities at the last minute. Even so, the day of lessons was impressive, discussing the Trinity, the reason why Jesus entered human history, Mary, Jesus’ parables and his presence in the Blessed Sacrament.

Zulma Garcia, 10, Isamar Morales, 11, and Claudia Herrera, 9, glued cotton balls on a white paper plate as they constructed angels, finishing with the placement of a guardian angel prayer in the center. They wore T-shirts that said “Solidarity Mission Village” in Sandy Springs. So far, their favorite part of the Corpus Christi celebration had been this track “to learn stuff about God,” said Claudia, who came because “I believe in God . . . I go to church. I love the church and I love God, too.”

Zulma and Isamar discussed their thoughts on God, who “protects our families and us and everybody else,” Isamar professed.

Al Frost and his daughter, Elissa, served as teachers together at one table. He looked on as Elissa asked questions which kids at the table quickly answered. Frost was confirmed in the church this past Easter and saw the day as a way of doing works and “impacting the lives of these children.”

Frost, who took the name of Augustine at confirmation, said he had struggled most of his life with the concept of religion, wanting hard facts and data “to go with the faith thing.”

At 43, he rediscovered in the Mass the concept “something cannot come out of nothing,” which had intrigued him since learning it in a college philosophy course years earlier. “‘Perhaps I was being too stubborn,’” he recalled thinking. “I began to open my eyes and realize that there was a lot of data out there already.”

Saturday’s event provided an opportunity for his entire family to minister together. “I watched my son, who is 12, leading a group of kids. I probably didn’t do something like that until I was in college. And my daughter, she did a nice job with kids at our table,” he said. “Every now and then it brings tears to my eyes to think that we can now do something like that as a family. We’re united in purpose, in faith. To see the kids there doing something good, before I probably wouldn’t have even been there.”

Frost’s wife, Debbie, served as one of the track’s coordinators. “Wonderful,” was how she described working alongside her husband and children. “There’s a whole new feeling of family.”

As he handed out “Good News Bingo” cards the children would color, teacher Don Gizinski said, “This is the fun part—when they get to eat Skittles.” Besides having to “run back and forth to the bathroom 50 times,” he said, the lessons ran smoothly. “The kids are doing it all. I just have to calm them down every now and then.”

Gizinski referred to his participation as “a family affair,” since his wife and 12-year-old daughter also served as teachers. He called the entire day an event for the whole family. “Kids are having fun. Parents are not worried about their kids . . . It’s great to be a part of something as worthwhile as this.”

Sitting at Gizinski’s table was Jon Truong, 11. He stood beside his youngest sister, age 5, and pointed to his other sister, age 9, at another table. Besides being with his sisters and making crafts, his favorite part was “going to adoration and being with Jesus.”

Volunteers had a chance to “be a fool for Christ,” Gamache said, during the section on prayer where the children learned that to sing is to pray twice. Here, they constructed bean tambourines with brightly colored streamers and paraded through the room singing, “I want to walk, walk like Jesus.”

The final activity focused on the Blessed Sacrament and how Jesus is present with us always. “It was all about the Blessed Sacrament in the host and how Jesus waits for us in every Catholic Church in tabernacles throughout the world,” Gamache said.

Nathan Anderson, 9, shared his thoughts on receiving the Eucharist. He remembered “getting pretty scared” before his first Communion, but said the practices helped. “I’m not scared now. Jesus won’t get mad if I do something wrong. You really can’t do anything wrong with him.”

Anderson goes weekly to a children’s hour of adoration at St. Peter Chanel Church, Roswell, where he is a parishioner. “It’s one whole hour to be with God and pray. Sometimes I really want to do something else and I get mad and it’s really tough, but afterwards I realize it was for the best.”

Prayer is important, he added, because “if you lose touch (with Jesus) the devil can tempt you.” He described Jesus as “powerful.” “He can do anything.”

In the activity on the Blessed Sacrament children glued a brown cross onto a white piece of paper with a gold doily and what looked like a host on top. When flipped open, the host revealed a sticker of Jesus children had placed in its center.

By this time, parents began arriving to pick up their children, Gamache said.

The program took months to prepare, calling on the talents of local catechists mainly from St. Catherine of Siena.

“These gals had the greatest ideas,” Gamache said. “It was great for people to work together on something this big. We hardly knew each other before this and now they’re like my best friends. I feel like I’ve been living with them for the last few months.”

Throughout the day, Gamache mused, “we were operating on a much higher plan than I had. There were some disgruntled parents and some unhappy children, but overall most people were happy with the job we did.”

This was one example of how God’s grace poured forth during a day “with a ton of obstacles.”

“We were seeing something supernatural,” Gamache said. “There’s no way a handful of people could have pulled this off.”

CUT AND PASTE -- Kathy Samaha, center, a parishioner at the Church of the Transfiguration, Marietta, serves as a parent volunteer during the children’s track. At this moment she is working with (l-r) Chelsea Sexton and Stefani Colclasure from the Church of the Transfiguration, Nicholas Simmons from St. Pius X Church, Conyers, and her 9-year-old son David.
Photo by Michael Alexander