"The Road to Emmaus" Radio Show History

In early May 2001, Deacon Rafael de los Reyes, Radio Peace Vice President of Special Projects, called Francisco de la Camara to explore the possibility of having a radio program produced by the Emmaus ministry on Radio Peace (AM 790). He explained that he and Rev. Alberto Cutie, Radio Peace General Director, had been moved from Radio Paz, the Spanish language radio station of the Archdiocese of Miami, to Radio Peace and were in the process of reevaluating the current program schedule. They had a great deal of success in increasing the listening audience of Radio Paz by including lay ministry produced shows that had the effect of fostering a grass roots type of support. He had also witnessed first hand the positive effect that the Emmaus ministry had on the parish of St. Theresa and thought it would be a wonderful ministry to produce a radio show.

He invited Francisco to a brainstorming session on May 18, 2001 attended by Rev Alberto Cutie, Scott Kadahl (Radio Peace Programming), Bill Brown (Community la Nueva Jerusalem), Rafael Cutie (Radio Peace Account Executive), Jim Horvath (Catholic Charismatic Services), MaryLou Cutie (Asst to the Assoc Director) and himself to explore the feasibility of the show. The most immediate obstacle to a ministry show, Francisco observed, was the fact that the Emmaus ministry is a parish level lay ministry and not centrally organized, therefore no one can truly claim to speak or act on its behalf. Compounding that, the ministry is divided into two groups, men and women, which are completely separate from each other. The project would require recruiting and managing a multiparish volunteer force to produce the show which would be a Herculean effort, but would be the only way to ensure broad participation and the ability to say it truly was an Emmaus show. Francisco agreed to launch an investigation into the feasibility of producing a show with these characteristics and give Deacon de los Reyes feedback one month later with the acknowledgement that if the response was positive the show would go on the air in early July, 45 days later.

Francisco immediately called two friends who are very involved in the Emmaus ministry to discuss their thoughts on the feasibility of the show, Jerry Marzullo and Bill Baty, the latter who is referred to by many as the Grandfather of Emmaus because of the number of years and retreats he has participated in. Over coffee, late one night in an IHOP, they decided that while certainly a difficult task it was an excellent opportunity for evangelization and that with the help of the Holy Spirit it could be done. It was here this night that the human decision was made to produce and air the radio show.

They began developing ideas for the show, segments, possible guests, topics…The need for a complimentary web site was decided as necessary as the show would only run for 30 minutes a week and the site would be available 24/7. The website would also prove to be an invaluable resource to the Emmaus ministry as a means of multiparish communication. It became immediately apparent that the group needed to expand as the number of tasks grew exponentially. In addition to looking for people involved in Emmaus that might be interested in participating, Francisco, Jerry and Bill began to think about who would host the show. At the brainstorming session it was suggested that a man and women should co host the show to be inclusive to both sexes and ministries, however since there was a shortage of time to launch the program it was decided to initially bring only men to the group, and later, when it was more developed include the women.

The Steering Committee, as they called themselves, immediately invited two more men to join the group that were very dedicated Catholics and very old hands in the Emmaus ministry having participated in numerous teams and assisting various parishes in launching their first retreats, Iñaki Saizarbitorio and Willie Castro. Iñaki came with extensive Emmaus contacts throughout the Archdiocese and Willie, while having extensive contacts also, was invited mainly for his communication skills and quick wit. With good communication skills (i.e. talks a lot) and a good radio voice, Willie was offered the coveted position of being the show's host. Fortunately for the Steering Committee, he accepted. He quickly took a leadership role in producing the show format, setting its content, finding recording equipment, recording studios and the like.

After several more late nights at the St. Theresa parish hall, and the local Starbucks, a larger more formal meeting was reconvened with the Reverend Cutie, Deacon de los Reyes and Scott Kadahl where the discussions ranged from technical capacities, to recording capabilities, to logistics, to marketing, show content and the like. It was decided to postpone the launch until late September and work furiously to grow the Steering Committee by reaching out to other parishes for participation. The Steering Committee had great expectations for the project however had to temper that with the fact that they had no budget to work with.

The team nonetheless was set, the details were worked out with the Archdiocese and the show somehow would go on. It was agreed that every parish needed to feel as if they had an ownership stake in the show and the Steering Committee would have to be expanded with members from other parishes. Mike Fresneda came on board from St. Kevin's to contribute on several fronts, technical and creative. Also, with the launch date pushed back and the tasks growing by the minute, it was agreed to bring the women's ministry aboard at this point so as to include their input, contributions and efforts. The group unanimously decided that Willie's wife, Mari Jimenez, was the perfect fit to co host the show because of her experience in the Emmaus ministry, commitment to the Church and ability to effectively communicate her positions verbally to her sometime opinionated husband. She graciously agreed to join and the group additionally invited Annie Figueroa from St. Thomas, also very experienced in Emmaus, a past retreat leader and advertising executive. Later Maria Bello from St. John Neumann came on board bringing technical knowledge and great spirituality. The Steering Committee members became project heads and were assigned tasks such as web site development, Emmaus parish liaisons, show producers, Archdiocese liaison and more. Each project head had to recruit talent to help them complete their assignments and the project began to take form. Many people were willing to help and be extremely generous with their time and resources. Web designers like Juan Carlos Alonso, web site builders such as Mickey Itchon, advertising firms like ABI Advertising and local parishes such as St. Theresa and St. Augustine… the list goes on. The radio show name was chosen to be "The Road to Emmaus" and the web site address www.emmausradio.org .

The launch date of the program which was set for September 28th arrived, and the Steering Committee delivered on schedule an excellent first show entitled "Life After Emmaus, Marriage" along with a live website. Launching the show however was only the beginning as the wish list of projects continues to grow. The state of Florida has now becoming the target market to evangelize in by helping launch Emmaus' ministries statewide, the radio show's reach has no limits being available on the internet and the web site content is growing rapidly. The entire Steering Committee has watched in amazement, incredulous at times, at how a seemingly unrealistic idea, spawned less than 90 days earlier, was growing and coming to fulfillment, alive and undeterred, filled with the Spirit of God. The radio show is a reality, the web site along with it; and while all the volunteers know they were all somehow a part of making it happen, they all know ultimately that they didn't. They all know who did!