Keith and Colleen Carls were leading the prayer meeting along with parishioners from St. Anthony's Catholic Church. Later, they visited Peggy in her flat.
Parishioners from St. Anthony's not only visited with Peggy in her home, but they also helped pay for her electricity and provided her with food. She now has a job which pays enough to meet most of her essential needs.
Keith: “You present the Gospel. You ask people to make a commitment to Jesus Christ. They do that. The first thing we try to do is integrate them into the local community. And the main part we try to integrate them into is Sunday Mass, the Eucharist.”
Peggy Robinson
“My happiness is just to get on my knees and pray. Praise God!”
Colleen: “We've been to so many families and visited them, and they've never turned us away. They've always welcomed us, and they've always been so open to hear the Good News and, you know, accept Jesus Christ. And so many people have come back to Mass and been part of this renewal process.”
St. OJ is a fictional parish used as a demo for the new e3mil parish portal
Church Facility
The church itself is located in beautiful Escondido, near the San Diego Wild Animal Park.
Parish History
St. OJ was founded on 9/27/00 by Kathryn A. Miller when she decided to use her boss's name as a demo parish portal church. Mrs. Miller created the url stoj.e3mil.com to host the parish portal for St. OJ. The parish was further brought to life by beautiful design and graphics created by the talented Matt Luckey. Later, Neil Buckley filled in some of the missing gaps as far as programming goes, and voila, there is now a virtual St. OJ parish in Escondido.
Map to Parish
This is a tough one since this is a virtual parish, but we'll make up a map anyway. If you haven't figured it out already, the internet address (only valid from within the e3mil office) is http://stoj.e3mil.com. But here is a fake map just to make us look real:
Peggy Robinson is an alcoholic. She and her son, Permanent, live in a small two-room flat near Johannesburg, South Africa. Peggy spent many years of her life in a drunken stupor. Sometimes, she would awaken to find other drunkards lying around the flat. She could not pay for electricity. Every bit of money she made went to buy more cheap liquor.
Peggy: “Sometimes, you know, I start to cry and say, 'I think I used to drink a lot…getting drunk.' Sometimes my child is sleeping here. I am in the house. I can't even know. All the windows are broken. I haven't got food.”
One night, as she stumbled home, she heard singing coming from her neighbor's flat.
Peggy Robinson
“I used to drink a lot…. I haven't got food.”
Peggy: “I was on my way…I come from a 'shabin.' I was so drunk. So I hear by my next-door-neighbor…there was a meeting, a prayer meeting. They start to pray and sing; and so, I feel today is my last day to drink. So I knock at the door and the woman of the house doesn't want me to go inside.”
The people inside the flat were singing, “My Jesus is alive! His name is Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus….”
Peggy continued to ask her neighbor to let her in, “I must get inside! So I ask her, 'Please, because today is my last day. I don't want to drink anymore, because I want to change my life; because I see nothing going right.' So they let me in and Keith started to pray for me. And they pray for me; and from that day, I never drink till today.”
The people at the prayer meeting were singing, “God, I call out to your name. Come Holy Spirit, I need you. Come. I pray.”
Peggy: “Then I start to worship and praise God. And I say, 'Jesus, I love you; because you are my king and my everything and my life.' Because He changed my life!”
Peggy: “So I'm happy. I'm happy! I'm very happy! All the time I'm happy. There's nothing like praising God. You can get drunk, but it destroys you. You can smoke cigarettes, but it also destroys you. Sometimes you are drunk…you're walking, you know, you walk in the night so you can get something that's suppose to make you happy. No. No, my happiness is just to get on my knees and pray. Praise God!”
Peggy's life has changed. She is supporting herself and her son. She is no longer drinking, and she is now attending Mass regularly. Her conversion came about because parishioners at St. Anthony's Catholic Church are reaching out to the people who live in the parish by visiting them in their homes.
