Jesus Sighted in Italy

Chad Riley, a 20-year old American recently went on a 13-student group 'vision trip' during Spring Break to Italy. He was walking behind a group of friends in Rome when he amazingly found Jesus. "I started yelling at my friends that it was Jesus," Riley said. "My friends thought I was having a religious moment."

In fact he had seen Jim Caviezel, who portrays Jesus in Mel Gibson's "The Passion of The Christ", but Riley could only remember the actor's role, not his name.

Caviezel was visiting Rome to be blessed by the Pope, and spent several minutes talking with the students after learning their purpose for being there. The movie had not yet been released in Italy so Caviezel was not disturbed by anyone else.

Riley said, "He preached to us about how our generation will have to be martyrs. He was very authentic and very nice. Caviezel referred to D.C. Talk's book "Jesus Freak" and quoted scripture to encourage them."

"If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first," Caviezel told them, quoting John 15:18. He also warned them that the devil would try to distract them from their mission.

"It really fired all of us up," Riley said. The trip was to help them figure out if they wanted to commit between one to five years of their lives to mission work in Italy with 'Campus Crusade for Christ'.

The long-term goal was for newly saved Italians to preach Christianity in other countries. That's what's happening now in Romania as the result of a recent partnership, Riley said.

Meeting Caviezel was a memorable experience for Riley but that wasn't the highlight of his week. Riley said that three Italians came to know Christ as a result of their ministry on campus and at bars, which is a high number considering that only two had been saved since August. Most of the people were receptive to the messages given by the students but were reluctant to change.

The Italians they came across took siestas during the day, ate around 9 p.m. then went to bars and drank, Riley said."It almost seems like they don't care about anything but having fun," Riley said, "their lives are real easy, so they don't want to change. That's why the ministry is so hard there."Many of the students grew up as Catholic but had now moved away from the church "and now they don't believe in anything".

The trip was an eye-opener for Riley,"Through this trip, God has really shown me that not everyone knows about the Gospel, and it is up to us to go and tell the good news," he said.

Riley last week decided to dedicate a year of his life to mission work. He will leave in August.

"I'm scared to death," he said. "But God calls for a willing heart and He will prepare you."

Riley needs to raise about $40,000 to do that, he said, but he has faith. Before going on the trip he sent out dozens of letters to raise money, but as the deadline for funds approached, he was getting worried when he had not received a single response. "Then, in one day, the mailbox was full," he said, and he had $3,000 to pay for his and another student's trip.

Chad Riley was part of an outreach that took 200 people to see "The Passion of The Christ" in Oxford, and he has said that one person was saved after the movie. Meeting Caviezel and seeing that he is a strong believer made the movie even more powerful to Riley, and made him more determined to go back to Italy. "It was a great experience," he said, "and I plan to go back, God willing."