Dear Lovers,

We hope that everyone had a fun and family filled Thanksgiving. As Advent begins we pray that we all may open our hearts to Christ to be born anew inside of us.

A lot has been happening this past month and there is much more upcoming! The new Community Leaders Resource Guidebook is out and receiving some good reviews. This guidebook was designed by our own Section 7 Continuing the Journey pillar couples as a resource for communities to build closeness and live out the mission of WWME. It was presented to the Rockford/Madison/Milwaukee community leaders at the Continuing the Journey meeting in October. We strongly encourage community leaders to use this book for presentations and formation of the community. For those communities who did not send a representative, we have your copy and will do our best to get it too you.

Has your sizzle turned into a fizzle? Well we are excited to announce a couple enrichment scheduled for January 22, 2005, at the St. Patrick Church in downtown St. Charles from 1:00 pm – 3:00 pm. Our speaker is Rory Rowland, who is an international professional speaker and will present “Romance after the Fairy Tale.” Mr. Rowland also was a guest speaker at a weekend long Marriage Encounter event in Kansas City in June of this year. The response was awesome and so we are very happy he can be here for this enrichment. This is a great primer for Valentines Day so we hope you will come and bring all your married friends!! The cost is $10 per couple. For more information and registration contact Alfonso & Margarita Martinez at (847) 854-1951.

It has been said that February is the month of love. And it’s easy to see why – Valentines Day! But February is special for WWME too! February 13th is World Marriage Day. To celebrate WMD we are co-sponsoring a couples event with the Office of Family Life of the Rockford Diocese. The musical comedy “I Do, I Do” will be presented on February 12th at NIU in DeKalb. There will be 2 showings of the play with an optional dinner in between. You can go to the early show and then dinner, or have dinner first and then attend the later show. Or just go for the play or dinner. Additional details will be posted here on the website and will also be available from your local community.

2005 is shaping up to be a great year for the Rockford, Madison, and Milwaukee Dioceses. We have 6 Weekends scheduled and plan on encountering 120 couples and 3 priests and/or religious. But we can’t do it alone. We need your dreams, your energy and love, and your determination to make each Weekend a reality. Without you, we are weak and ineffective and Marriage Encounter will fade out in our area. But we have the tools and gifts to make the Weekend strong and thriving. Most importantly, we have God on our side. We know that the Weekend is His and it’s His gift to married couples, priests, and religious. There are two things we can do to keep our Weekends strong and alive. We MUST invite couples! And we MUST invite priests and religious! We are in control of our Weekends if we make inviting a part of our lifestyle, pray always, and we focus on doing God’s work for God and not for us. We also need to make Marriage Encounter visible within our parishes. We need you to do witness talks in your parishes and make sure your parish has WWME brochures and regular bulletin announcements. We need our communities to volunteer to help in whatever way your parish needs you. As a movement we can support our priests in the parish and be an example of sacramental love and commitment to others within our parishes. Our priests will appreciate the help and love that you give them. And we do need to love our priests now more than ever.

We’d like to close this month's letter with a dialogue challenge that we have given to our presenting teams. Yes, we struggle with dialogue, too. But we are committed to a dialoguing lifestyle. And sometimes we need a little challenge; so here goes. We challenge you, our Encountered couples, to daily dialogue for the entire month of December. We think it’s a great Christmas gift to each other and we think your Holidays will be blessed with a close relationship and a peaceful bliss. If you need questions or a refresher course check out the dialogue section on our website or link up to the National WWME website. There is a lot of great support available for dialogue!! Pass the challenge along and don’t forget to one-ring your community couples after you have dialogued!!! We’ll be dialoguing along with you!! We love you all!!! Have a wonderful and blessed Christmas and New Year!

Garry & Arla Thomas
(847) 658-1585
getart@flash.net

This month inaugurates a new column for our Website. Each month we will highlight a new area of the site just in case you haven't yet had a chance to see it.

This month begins with a new feature. Have seen this image along the left side of the site's pages and wondered what it was? Well, if this image is displayed, it means that support for the site is only a click away. It means that the Webcouple, or another support couple, is online and ready to answer your questions. It's also a method for first-time visitors to get real-time help and answers to their questions.

If you see the image to the right, however, it is an indication that support is not online and real-time. However, it does give you the opportunity to send a message to the Webcouple via eMail. As always, responses from the Webcouple are usually answered within 24 hours.

Daily Dialogue is a wonderful thing. But don't stop dialoguing just because we may have missed some days, weeks, or months. We should be flexible as to when we will dialogue. We don't need to set a fixed schedule and do it at the exact same time each day. However, we do need to keep in mind that it should be a time when we are not interrupted.

One of the keys to dialoguing is to remind ourselves that we are only spending 20 minutes a day doing this. Ten minutes for writing, and ten minutes talking to each another. Another helpful hint is to have a supply of questions readily available. Our Website can help in that area. Check out our Dialogue section for topics and questions.

We should never ask our spouse why he/she wrote or said something. This is a time for listening, not for judging. If we are apart, take advantage of the Internet by utilizing eMail or a chat room. Another option is to write the letters daily daily and then read them all when we are back together and have one discussion about them.

Focus on your feelings rather than your thoughts. This may be the most difficult for some of us, but it is imperative that we do just that. Check out the section of our Website that focuses on feeling words.

We should not try to change our spouse through Dialogue. Dialogue is meant to strengthen our relationship through understanding, not through change.

Also, remember to separate when we write if we are writing at the same time. Writing together may be a distraction. And remember. Don't go over the ten minutes writing and ten minutes talking. If necessary, set a timer.

There's fun for the whole family in our "Fun Stuff" section.

We received some feedback on our crossword puzzle section and have modified our approach. Beginning this month, the puzzles now have the capability to display letters or words on demand. We've also included a "Solve" feature which will complete the puzzle for you.

We've also added some more trivia quizzes for those so inclined. For December, we have included some Christmas trivia. Think you know Christmas? Go to our quiz page and try it out. You have to register to play, but it only takes a few seconds and then you're in business, or should we say, "you're in the fun."

We have also included a place for you to share your favorite recipes with other Encountered Couples. Everyone knows that Community nights are all about the food. Why else would everyone gather around the kitchen? Just kidding!

And last, but certainly not least, are our downloadable screen savers for your PC. And as if that wasn't enough, we can customize and create your very own, personalized version of one of the available styles.

We are all family and we believe in the lifestyle and mission of Worldwide Marriage Encounter. From time to time we need assistance in fulfilling that mission. To that end, we have installed a quick survey and we want to get some information for what assistance you might be willing or considering to offer.

Is the Spirit calling you to be more involved in the WWME movement?

The Rockford/Madison/Milwaukee Marriage Encounter Community is in great need of couples who want to be more actively involved in changing the world one couple at a time! Listed below are some of the ways you can help. If you have any questions about any of these jobs or if you're a Community Leader and have a couple in mind that you think would be a great asset to any of these communities please contact Ben & Jane Deutsch at (630) 377-0635 for more information.

SUPPORT COMMUNITY
House Couple: Responsible for the set up and takedown of the Weekend. This job is split between 2 couples.
Greeter Couple: This couple is responsible for scheduling communities to greet on & off for the Weekend.
Prayer Couple Coordinator East: This couple is responsible for making sure all couples on the Weekend from the Eastern part of the Rockford Diocese have a prayer couple and extended Dialogue letter.
Prayer Couple Coordinator North: This couple is responsible for making sure that all Wisconsin couples making the Weekend have a prayer couple and extended dialogue letter.

CONTINUING THE JOURNEY COMMUNITY
Community Start up Couple: This couple would be responsible with helping the CTJ Leaders to get new communities started up. CTJ is also looking for seasonal couples who could help with different functions throughout the year. These different committees would be for "Puttin' on the Ritz" dance, WWME Family campout, and the Rolle Bolle tournament.

INVITING COMMUNITY
Ministry Fair Coordinators: This couple would be responsible for tracking and getting help, if needed, for parish ministry fairs.
Media Coordinators: This couple would be responsible for planning and placing ads in different Catholic publications. They would also explore other media vehicles for getting the WWME word out to people.
Mass Talk Workshop Couple(s): This couple/couples would be responsible for coordinating those couples who already have Mass talks written. They would also workshop couples who would like to write and present Mass talks throughout the 3 dioceses.
Pulpit Pal Coordinators: This couple would be responsible with the scheduling and maintenance of our pulpit pal boards. These new inviting tools are used in the backs of various churches as another means for getting the word out for the Weekend.

Is your community looking for a great way to invite couples to the Weekend? A romantic candlelight dinner might be what your community is looking for. Candlelight dinners are easy to give and fun for the whole community. The Rockford/Madison/Milwaukee WWME Community has 2 candlelight dinner kits available for use. Each kit contains all you need to help your community put on a romantic candlelight dinner. If your community is hosting a candlelight dinner please let us know and we'll announce it here in The eSpirit. For more information contact Garry & Arla at (847)658-1585 or by email at: getart@flash.net

"The Twelve Days of Christmas" Song, seems to be a nonsensical song, but it's recorded as being written during the period of time when Roman Catholics in England were not allowed to practice their faith without punishment (which would explain why no one credits themselves for penning it), the song was to help children to remember the tenets of their faith. Some dispute this though, because everything in the song goes along with both the Church of England and the Roman Catholic Church.

• The true love was God Himself.
• The me was any baptized person.
• The "partridge in a pear tree" was Christ and may refer to Matt. 23:37 and Luke 13:34.
• The "2 turtle doves" were the Old and New Testaments.
• The "3 French hens" stood for faith, hope and love (1 Cor. 13): The Theological Virtues.
• The "4 calling birds" were the 4 gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John: The Four Evangelists.
• The "5 golden rings" recalled the Torah or law: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy. The Law or Pentateuch.
• The "6 geese a laying" were the 6 days of creation.
• The "7 swans a swimming" were the 7 gifts of the Holy Spirit (1 Cor. 7:30) The 7 Sacraments.
• The "8 maids a milking" were the eight Beatitudes. (Matt. 5-6).
  The "9 ladies dancing" were the 9 truths of the Holy Spirit (Gal. 5).
• The "10 Lords a leaping" were the 10 Commandments.
• The "11 pipers piping" were the 11 faithful apostles.
• The "12 drummers drumming" symbolized the 12 points of belief in the Apostle Creed.

Note: In the original version the first 5 gifts were all birds, 1st day = Partridge, 2nd day = 2 Turtle Doves, 3rd day = 3 French Hens, 4th day = 4 Colly Birds (Blackbirds) not Calling birds, and on the 5th day = 5 Golden Rings (referred to ring-necked pheasants) not jewelry.

Angel Hair Chicken Pasta

• 3 skinless, boneless chicken breast halves
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 1/2 of a .7 ounce package of dry Italian-style salad dressing mix
• 1/4 cup white wine
• 1/2 can of condensed golden mushroom soup
• 2 ounces cream cheese with chives
• 1 (8 ounce) package of angel hair pasta

A man and his wife were having some problems at home and were giving each other the silent treatment. Suddenly, the man realized that the next day, he would need his wife to wake him at 5:00 AM for an early morning business flight.

Not wanting to be the first to break the silence (and LOSE), he wrote on a piece of paper, "Please wake me at 5:00 AM." He left it where he knew she would find it. The next morning, the man woke up, only to discover it was 9:00 AM and he had missed his flight.

Furious, he was about to go and see why his wife hadn't wakened him, when he noticed a piece of paper by the bed. The paper said, "It is 5:00 AM. Wake up."