De La Mennais Brothers: Making Jesus Christ better known and loved by young people

I myself was born in England to Irish parents, but 2 of my great-grandparents on my mother’s side were German and came to settle in Ireland in around 1860. Two years ago I did a sponsored cycle from Lourdes (S. France) to Fulda (central Germany - the shrine of St. Boniface), passing through Triberg in the Black Forest region of Germany, the home town of my great-grandfather, Stefan (Stephen) Faller. Though I didn’t meet any relatives, I spoke to local people who knew the clan of the Fallers. The surname actually originated from the town of Triberg itself (it’s to do with a mountain waterfall…). The whole experience felt so much like coming home that arriving in my final destination of Fulda felt like an anti-climax in comparison. An added element in the whole story is that he and his family were all Jewish, converting en masse to Catholicism when they arrived in Ireland, something my mother only told us siblings about 5 years ago, a couple of years before her death. Stephen Faller’s je...

I’m on the mailing list of this Christian singer/songwriter. I found his latest missive, received today, rather moving, as is his latest album, actually. Here’s a large part of that mailing (and click here for the complete text ): "As I’ve blabbed about before, my great-grandfather was from Sweden—a place called Kalmar, which may sound familiar to you Wingfeather Saga readers—so from my first visit till now my connection to that part of the world has steadily deepened. I did so much research into Peterson family history that on my last tour I was able to stand in the ruins of the cottage where my great-grandfather was born. This time around we saw so many friends that we’ve made there over the years and experienced that sweet fellowship that only the church can provide. But check this out. Last Sunday the connection deepened even more because I was able to locate a second cousin—a Swede who had been trying to locate our branch of the family tree in order to find out what happened ...