4/5/2016 - Acts 4:32-37 – Tuesday of the 2nd week of Easter

       Back in the summer of 2002, I visited the countries of Argentina and Chile on a fellowship I had that summer.  It was an amazing summer visiting two countries with such a rich history and with so much to learn from them. While in northern Argentina visiting Iguazu Falls on the border with Brazil, I had the wonderful opportunity of visiting some of the ruins of the Jesuit reductions, settlements that the Jesuit missionaries established in the 17^th and 18^th centuries with the indigenous people of that region.  In these settlements, the missionaries and the people lived together and shared their lives together as a Christian community.  In these reductions, the people worked the land, they raised animals and crops, produced items for sale, and lived in common similar to what is described in today’s description from the Early Church in the Acts of the Apostles.  Even the Enlightenment philosopher Jean Jacques Rousseau, generally not a fan of the Catholic Church, admired the work of Jesuits and the utopian communities they formed in the South American reductions. The countries of Portugal and Spain were jealous of the Jesuits and their success.  The Jesuit missions were forcibly disbanded in 1767, ending this very interesting chapter in the history of South American and in the history of the Catholic Church.  Soon after, the Jesuits were disbanded by the Pope in all of Europe except for Russia, where many of the Jesuits lived in exile until they were allowed back in the early 19^th century. The example of the Early Church as described in the Acts of the Apostles can teach us many lessons in the values of the Gospel.  How are we in modern America living out those values?