May I?

"Sister, what are these? They're gorgeous!"
"Paper bracelets. See, this is how you wear them."
I wrapped it around the teen's wrist and his eyes widened in amazement.
"These are so cool! How long did it take you to make them?"
"Oh, about an hour. And yes, the sisters were about to kill me because we made over 150 of them!"

The sisters and I were again at Marian Days in Carthage, Missouri.
The heat was stifling and we were blessed to have friends and strangers buy us iced sugarcane juice or rau má throughout the day.

"How much are they?" the seven-year-old looked up at Sr. Marciana Chuẩn.
"None at all. We're not selling them. We're giving them away," she replied.
We weren't the only religious community giving away free stuff. The Divine Word Missionaries gave away fans, the Redemptorists gave away pens, and the Holy Ghost fathers were giving away flashlights. All these items had our websites imprinted on them with the hope that some of these young people would go on-line, visit our websites, and hear God's voice amidst all the conveniences of modern life.

A few minutes later, the little girl and her two friends returned to our booth.
"Sister, I can't buy them. But I may donate right?"
"Oh yes, you may always give!" Sr. Marciana Chuẩn said with a gentle smile.
"Here." she handed us a ten dollar bill and each of her two friends gave us five dollars.

The smile on her face was bigger and deeper than the Thúy Nga singers across from us, raking in thousands of dollars from the sales of their music videos.

Photo: The front view of our vocations booth at Marian Days. In the corner is a sample of one of our bracelets. The wreaths were handmade by Sr. Ann Hương, CMR.

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