History of Tres Dias (by Dave McManigal)

It’s quite well known that the history of Tres Dias dates back to the Catholic Cursillo Movement, and that the first Tres Dias weekend was held at the Oblate House in Newburgh, NY in 1972. What is NOT well known are the people who were instrumental in bringing about this movement.

During our 35th Anniversary Celebration in July, 2007, we took the opportunity to fly Dave McManigal from his Midwest home to the Mid Hudson Valley so he could be part of the Celebration.  Dave was the Rector of the first men’s weekend in November, 1972, and the one universally recognized as the instigator of Tres Dias.  At some point IBM transferred Dave to the midwest so he lost contact with the Tres Dias ministry.  He expressed immense surprise when he learned that the ministry he helped start is now worldwide with over 100 chartered or emerging communities. What follows are his recollections.  NOTE:  He did ask that we include the caveat that these recollections “derive from the memory of a fallible senior citizen 35 years after the fact!”

genesis n., pl -ses    1. A coming into being: ORIGIN.    2. Genesis.  −  See table at BIBLE.

(Webster’s II New College Dictionary) 

Prologue

Over the years, I have been asked many times to describe the origin of Tres Días. On one occasion, I attempted an essay on the subject; however, the nearness of the events at that time filled me with so much emotion that I was unable to describe them rationally. What I produced resembled the ravings of a lunatic more than an understandable history. What I write now is an attempt to rectify that situation. Please excuse my frequent use of first person singular pronouns; I am relating first person experience.

Some may call it a series of coincidences, but I prefer to think that it was the will of God that led me to instigate the Christian experience that now is known as Tres Días. I have chosen these words most carefully. I was not called, in the sense that a pastor has a calling; I was led to do certain works, as were many others. I did not found Tres Días, as that was the work of our Lord. In fact, after experiencing a Roman Catholic Cursillo de Cristiandad (Spanish for “short course in Christianity”), I did work diligently for a full year to found a version of the Cursillo geared to Protestant traditions; my failure was abject and complete. After that humbling experience, I found that I had instigated the thing that I was trying to found in my earlier hubris. But now I’m getting ahead of the story, so I’ll start again at the beginning.

Preparation

In 1971 I was a deacon of The Reformed Church in America, employed as a manager at IBM Corporation’s development facility in Poughkeepsie, New York. One of my friends of long standing was Ron Rupert, another IBMer and a Roman Catholic.

One day I answered my home phone and heard Ron’s voice asking me to participate in something called a Cursillo. Ron pronounced it “cur-see-yoe”, so that’s about how I spelled it on the phone message pad. I had no idea what a Cursillo might entail, but I trusted Ron, so I said, “Sure!” I filled out the Cursillo application form that Ron mailed to me and soon found myself, on a Thursday evening in April 1971, at the Marian Shrine in West Haverstraw, New York.

I was the only Protestant at the Marian Shrine that weekend, and it took some getting used to. However, I still trusted Ron, so I was determined to go with the flow of events. The events of Thursday evening were strange to me, but so was my first day at boot camp when I joined the U.S. Navy, and that didn’t turn out too badly.

On Friday, I began to get into the spirit of things, and by Saturday evening I was completely sold! This was an indescribably marvelous spiritual journey. A few questions asked of the Cursillo leaders during breaks revealed that only a handful of Protestants had been allowed to share the Cursillo experience, and the Catholic hierarchy wasn’t overly happy about even that small sharing.

I was absolutely convinced that the Cursillo experience was needed by Protestants as much as it was needed by Catholics. A few Protestants who happened to have good friends in the Cursillo movement were fortunate, but that just wasn’t good enough for me. A separate movement for Protestants was needed, but it didn’t seem to be my place to suggest such a thing, let alone initiate it.

After talking about this idea with a Catholic priest named Denis Kelleher, with whom I shared a discussion table, he suggested that we take the matter to the Lord in prayer. During the next break period, we did just that. Denis introduced me to a technique that some Christians deride as “Bible roulette.” We prayed together for guidance, then I opened my pocket-size New Testament at random and read the first words my eyes fell upon:

So they remained for a long time, speaking boldly for the Lord, who testified to the word of his grace by granting signs and wonders to be done through them. [Acts 14:3]

Denis said, “Wow, what an answer!” Partly because I really believed that this was a message from God and partly because I was completely awed by the task, I was unable to speak. In a word, I was overwhelmed. I had no idea of what to do or how to do it.

It’s been said that “the journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step”, but it’s rather important that the journey have a destination, and that the first step be taken in the right direction.

The First Step

My Cursillo weekend seemed to turn me into the Energizer bunny–an unstoppable bundle of frenetic energy! Of course, some people really would have preferred that I just go away, or at least shut up! A Cursillo cross–a beautiful silver-on-ebony crucifix–had been presented to me at the closing of my Cursillo weekend. I wore it on my chest almost everywhere, though I had to keep it under my shirt at work. I talked to anybody and everybody I could corner for any length of time about developing a Protestant Cursillo. I worked–at first unofficially but later as an official team member–on every men’s Cursillo weekend for the next year. I attended meetings of the Cursillo Council, at first uninvited, but later as an invited, non-voting member. I participated in a Cursillo de Cursillos, a Cursillo-like weekend designed to train Cursillo leaders. Once again I was the lonely Protestant.

I pleaded, begged, wheedled…in short, I made myself a terrible nuisance to all the Cursillo leaders! However, it wasn’t just selfish reluctance to share that deterred those leaders from acting. The relatively new English language Cursillo organization was dependent upon the more established Spanish Cursillo Council for support–especially from the Catholic Archdiocese, which could have shut down the Cursillo movement with a single edict.

After a year of total failure, I gave up. I shed a few tears, put away my Cursillo cross, and went to bed, totally beaten and broken in spirit.

The next day (truly!) I received a telephone call from Helmut Maier, a member of the Cursillo Council, who said that the Council had finally decided to take the risk in a limited way. They would allow us to contact members of the Cursillo community to solicit help, and they would allow us to use Cursillo materials, such as talk outlines and team handbooks, so long as we did not use the Cursillo name or involve the Council directly in any way.

Helmut asked what I would need to get started. I replied that all we’d need would be a list of names and addresses of all Protestants who had participated in Cursillo weekends. That evening, Helmut and I sat down together with the Council’s list of all participants, and we extracted the names of Protestants. There were about a dozen, but I cannot recall either the exact number or all the names.

That was the real beginning. Subsequent activities seemed to have lives of their own…they just happened! A few dedicated volunteers did mountains of work without preparation or noticeable effort.

The Meetings

I used the list that Helmut and I had extracted to send a letter to all the Cursillo-experienced Protestants in the New York–New Jersey–Connecticut region, inviting all to a meeting at the Hopewell Reformed Church in Hopewell Junction, New York, where I was a deacon. I had persuaded the pastor, Rev. Ian Todd, to experience a Cursillo weekend a few months earlier, so he was ready to support the activity. Ian later served as spiritual director of the first Tres Días weekend.

At the first meeting there was immediate, unanimous agreement that a Cursillo-like experience for Protestants was needed, and that the responsibility of organizing it devolved on us. Once that was agreed, the question of a name was introduced. Some thought it premature, but I pointed out that it would be very difficult to discuss an unnamed “thing” among ourselves, let alone with others. Therefore, we set about coming up with a name.

Bob and Mary Essert, who were active and tireless workers from the outset, had read about an ecumenical Christian community in France, known as Taizé. They suggested “Taizé Weekend” as a working name, and those present agreed. I accepted the task of contacting Taizé for permission to use the name, and immediately sent a letter to the Prior of Taizé.

At the next meeting, the response from Taizé declared that the name was theirs alone, and no other use of it would be countenanced. Therefore, back to the original search for a name, we went around the table seeking other ideas. Several were suggested and rejected out of hand because they didn’t “sing” as one attendee put it. Then someone, I believe it was Otto Tatar, suggested that we call the weekend just what it is: “three days.” Strongly in favor of honoring the Spanish origin of the Cursillo movement, I translated “three days” to Spanish: Tres Días. That name was adopted by acclamation.

The balance of that meeting, and others to follow during the six months of meetings before the first weekend, was full of administrative details too numerous and boring to recount, even if I could recall them. For example, we had to find a way to generate printed materials without spending a lot of money. At each meeting, we put a cup on the meeting table to hold donations. Nobody there was rich, but just about everyone managed to come up with a few dollars at each meeting. Still, we couldn’t afford to have materials printed, nor could we afford to buy a copy machine.

Bob Essert, as on other occasions, was our “angel”! He came up with a broken-down Gestetner mimeograph machine. I agreed to try to overhaul the relic, though daunted by its sad condition. After several evenings of work in my family room, the clunking hulk was operational, in a manner of speaking. With a few well-chosen prayers and the occasional well-placed kick, one could get usable copies out of the thing. Of course, being the only person experienced in such inducements, responsibility for generating printed materials fell on yours truly.

Then, there was the job of obtaining and editing Cursillo materials for Protestant purposes, sometimes completely rewriting them. Given that I was the one who ran the stencils, it seemed only fitting that I should produce them. So it was written (in the minutes), and so it was done.

Next we came to team selection. Possibly because of my Cursillo leadership training, but probably only because nobody (including me) really wanted to tackle the job, I was elected rector of Men’s Tres Días Number 1. Although terrified of the prospect, I had learned to trust God enough to say “Yes!”

The “meeting group” then designated itself The Ad Hoc Tres Días Secretariat.

The First Weekend

The first weekend actually began some time before November 2, 1972, when the participants of Tres Días Number 1 arrived at Our Lady of Hope Seminary in Newburgh, New York. Our Lady of Hope was generally known as “the Oblate House” because it was the training facility for priests of the Catholic order known as Oblates of Mary Immaculate.

We had found the Oblate House seemingly by chance; however, nobody involved doubted that we were guided to it. I don’t recall with assurance who learned about the availability of the facility, but I think it was Al Green, who did the Piety talk and lived near the Oblate House. Once the facility was described at a Secretariat meeting I visited it immediately. Fr. Bagan, who was the priest in charge and (I believe) the only full-time resident, was at first leery of dealing with a newly-formed Protestant group with limited and questionable financial resources. Despite his misgivings, he finally agreed to let us use the Oblate House for one weekend in return for an equal share in any donations we might receive, after satisfying direct expenses. From our perspective, it was a wonderful arrangement; half of nothing is nothing, so it was absolutely risk-free.

As the weekend approached, however, expenses of preparation were rising beyond our limited resources. That was when another “angel” arose: Rev. Ian Todd, my pastor and the team’s spiritual director, offered us $600 (a large sum in 1972) from his personal emergency fund (not church money). Happily, we were able to repay Ian’s loan later, although he had not asked for or expected repayment.

After being elected rector of Tres Días #1, my first task was to bring together a team. Of course, given the small number of Protestants, many team members had to be Catholic. The spiritual directors were the exceptions, as it was mandatory for our identity as a Protestant movement that they be Protestant ministers. Fortunately, Rev. Ian Todd and Rev. George Conger, an Episcopal priest, agreed to serve as spiritual directors, and we were blessed with enough talented and capable volunteers to have a fine team. On the weekend, I don’t believe that most participants paid attention to who was Catholic and who was Protestant. It just didn’t matter. However, I do recall one fellow from an evangelical church saying over breakfast, “If Grandma could only see me now, sharing my faith with a bunch of Catholics!”

One Catholic team member turned out to be a double blessing. George Burke joined the team to do the Study talk and to be a table leader. George, together with his wife, Carol, ran a Christian bookstore in Wappinger Falls, New York, so he was a good choice for Study. However, the Tres Días Secretariat was having trouble coming up with a cross to use for the weekend.

Obviously, we could not use the Cursillo cross (a crucifix) but we could not agree on an alternative. Some suggestions were well-liked, but they were too expensive. Others were labor-intensive and lacked a reliable source of supply. Some others were just plain ugly to some viewers. So it went, until George brought a cross to a team meeting and informed us that he had just received a supply that would be adequate for our first weekend. Moreover, they were inexpensive, beautiful, and available from a dependable supplier. They were approved on the first vote!

Since then, the outline of that lovely, simple cross has become the Tres Días logo.

By the way, George did a great Study rollo, but he had a bit of trouble as a table leader. He got a batch of hard-core Bible students at his table, and he described the result as a “can-you-top-this scripture quoting contest” that lasted until Saturday. At that point the scripture quoters apparently realized that Christianity is not just a matter of memorization, and they started to pay attention. Their words at the closing revealed a lot of recent learning, and I don’t recall a single scripture quotation among them!

Because the weekend was essentially an experiment, it was more intense than any other I have experienced. There were a few shaky moments, but in the end, the Cursillo method, which we followed as rigorously as possible, worked just as well as in any Cursillo. A women’s weekend, with Lorraine Travis as rector, followed in short order, and was similarly successful.

The rest, of course, is history.

Click here to view the material from Men’s #1

Epilogue

Additional words at this point would be pointless, excepting perhaps these few:

Praise God for all his wondrous gifts!

Blessings and peace,

Dave McManigal
Miami, Oklahoma
May, 2007

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On behalf of Mid Hudson’s Secretariat, this history is posted with thanks to Dave McManigal.  In particular, with the grateful recognition of how the Lord used Dave and his contemporaries to bring this ministry into creation, and the recognition of the many who followed in their footsteps – often without recognition but under the Lord’s guidance – in bringing this ministry to where it is today!

NOTE:  It is with profound sadness that we learned that Dave went to be with the Lord in 2011

As the song says:  “…May those who come behind us find us faithful!“

De Colores!