Emmaus expands participants’ spiritual lives, deepens their discipleship, and rekindles their gifts as Christian leaders in their churches and communities.
Love ~
The weekend should be an environment of unconditional love in which persons can
gradually lower their defenses and allow God to touch their lives with grace.
Joy ~ The
Walk to Emmaus is full of occasions of true joy: the joy of singing, the joy of
self-expression or uninhibited laughter, the joy of insight, the joy of
liberation, the joy of knowing God’s presence, the joy of feeling accepted and
the joy of finally giving one’s life wholeheartedly and without reservation to
Jesus Christ.
Peace ~ When
people walk in the Spirit, they enjoy the fruit of peace with God and one
another.
Patience ~Even
though the pilgrims follow the same path, each one’s experience is unique. The
pilgrims hear and see the Lord in their own way, according to their needs and
God’s will for them at the time of the Walk.
Kindness ~
Kindness is specific acts of caring, attention and undeserved charity.
Goodness ~
Team membership and community support responsibilities for the Walk should be
understood as spiritual exercises in selfless love and Christian servanthood.
Faithfulness ~
Each Walk depends on the team members faithfulness to God, to team leaders, to the
Upper Room Emmaus model and to the pilgrims. When persons accept the call to
serve on an Emmaus team, they enter into an implicit covenant with God and the
Emmaus community to make the Emmaus Walk possible at it’s best for the people
who will be called to participate.
Gentleness ~
Because the Walk is a highly structured experience, the pilgrims need to be led with
gentleness. Gentle leadership means conducting the Walk with both firmness and
flexibility.
Self-Control ~ Team members must guard against the temptation to talk rather than listen, to dominate discussions with authoritative tone, or to presume the role of a spiritual guru who can tell the pilgrims what they “really need.”