from the Georgia Bulletin, Archdiocese of Atlanta...
It is easy to see after spending just a few minutes with Tiara Chivers that her faith is very dear to her. She clearly remembers her experiences as a child and has kept a scrapbook of significant mementos from her adult faith life also.
One of her earliest memories is attending a Protestant church with her parents and older brothers. It was an important time for her as a young girl growing up in Michigan because she always felt a connection with God and the church. However, she remembers that it wasn’t long before she was attending services all by herself.
“As I child I would go to church with my family, but very quickly my parents and my brothers kind of fell off of going to church,” she said. “But some of my earliest memories are of my mom making sure I went.”
“I was so excited. I loved church,” she added.
Chivers continued attending services alone, always taking with her a handkerchief neatly packed with coins for the collection given to her by her mother. As she entered her teenage years she began “hitchhiking” to church, asking friends and neighbors if they were going on Sunday so she could ride along.
When she was 15, Chivers participated in a foreign exchange program that sent her to study and live with a Catholic family in Madrid, Spain. She learned about Spanish language and culture and, especially, about the faith of her host family.
“I remember going to Mass, and I remember vividly walking in . . . and it just felt like home,” she said.
Even though the Mass was celebrated in a language she could not fully understand, she felt an immediate connection to the liturgy.
“I was at peace. I just knew that was it,” she said...Read on...
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