What a Great Day Looks Like

Hello! It's been a long time since I've posted anything up here, but I just wanted to share some of the AWESOME things going on with our SPIRITUS Youth Ministry at Resurrection Parish in Green Bay.

Yesterday was a long, crazy day, but it was soooo awesome! The entire Green Bay team dropped by Notre Dame Middle School (right next door to where Noah and I live!) to visit one of our fellow youth ministers and get some fantastic insights into how to build great relationships with the youth we minister to. Then, it was off to the office for a whirlwind of preparation for our Young Neighbors in Action retreat. The YNIA group at Resurrection consists of 19 teens and 5 adults who will be taking a mission trip to Nebraska this summer. (Young Neighbors in Action is a ministry of the Center for Ministry Development. You can read more about it here.)

First, the teens were given their sweet T-shirts, designed by them at our last meeting back in January. Then, everyone piled into cars to visit the Oneida Cultural Center, where we learned a LOT about the culture and history of the Oneida Nation. The YNIA trip in July will take place at the St. Augustine Mission, which serves the Omaha and Winnebago tribes, so this background gives our teens just a little bit of a head start on understanding the people they will be serving.

After that, everyone returned to Resurrection for some pizza and other treats. The students enjoyed the chance to stretch, chat, and absorb the information they had just taken in. Meanwhile, we were busily running around, printing out some last-minute handouts for the students. I also had to go pick up the pizza, which I like to think I delivered at exactly the right time. (Though I don't think anyone is about to hire me as a pizza delivery driver!) In any case, the teenagers were quite hungry and devoured the food.

After a short presentation about our deep obligation as Catholics to enter into the mission of Jesus by "proclaiming good news to the poor" (see Luke 4:18) and a great discussion about how to prepare our hearts and souls to do that on the YNIA mission trip, we got to the most anticipated part of the night: PAINTING! I was able to get last-minute permission on Tuesday to let the teens paint our youth room (thus leading to a last-minute trip to purchase paint that made my day much more exciting than expected, to say the least), and they did an AWESOME job! Take a look!

Just adding a little color.

A small army of dedicated teenagers attack the large, white wall.

Working as a team. 

Painting a wall yellow naturally puts a smile on your face!

After the teens left for the night, Julie got into the painting as well. I don't have a picture of the entire wall, but this gives a pretty good idea of what it will eventually look like.