“Let your Light Shine” – St Wilfrid’s Youth Ministers
The lights of St Wilfrid’s Parish, Garston shone brightly on a dull Saturday in November as they gathered at Carmel Monastery, Maryton for their first ever Youth Ministry retreat day. St Wilfrid’s is blessed with a host of musicians, altar servers and readers amongst others. 21 of them ranging from Year 4 to Year 12 experienced a day exploring Gifts and Talents. The Avengers may seem like an unlikely focus for spirituality, but each “superpower” that these superheroes displayed inspired the young people to create their own superheroes from their own gifts and talents: music, sport, entertaining, dance, singing, reading, baking, drawing, running…. the list went on! Concluding with some spiritual moments in the chapel, the youth ministers reflected on using their gifts and talents in love for the greater good of their parish. They appreciated being able to come together in a different environment, getting to know each another and praying with one another.
Fr Joe Kendall commented: “The future of our parish is in safe hands. Having seen how our youth come together like this is inspiring for all of us!”
Many thanks to the adults, Yasmin Maassarani and Jo Wallace who led the day, supported by the Pastoral Associate Helen Jones, to Fr Joe for his continued support of the young people and to Sr Patricia and the sisters at Maryton for their encouragement and generous use of their convent. St Wilfrid’s Youth is indeed “Called and Gifted by God” and their lights truly shone at Carmel, brightening a gloomy day with the light of their lives.
Report below by Beth Hughes
Our Day of Reflection
On Saturday the 9th November, several children with important roles in our parish, such as altar servers and members of the music ministry, met at the Carmelite monastery for a day of reflection. One of the first things I noticed was the wide range of ages and how lovely it was to see the familiar faces in a more social environment. In fact some of the children I had never spoken to before, and it was great to get to know them. The first thing we did was to get to know each other more personally, by playing a game of Human Bingo. We had a grid of facts and had to ask around the group who had, for example, “visited London” or who “likes pineapple on pizza”, and fill in their names. Then like a normal game of Bingo whoever got a row won. This helped us become more familiar with each other as well as learn something new about each of us in the group.
We then discussed how each of us has different talents and how these differences make us unique, and special. To reinforce this important lesson… we had some creative fun! We split into groups, where we created super heroes that included elements of all our talents from the group. From “Performing Polly”, a cake baking robot, a super hero powered by girl power to even a flute/ violin playing, cardboard box wearing superhero who could certainly work the catwalk. We had it all. But the important lesson we took from this crazy jumble of cardboard, tissue paper and a lot of sellotape was that although the superheroes looked different they were all important. Their mixture of gifts and talents allowed them to shine, and this is the same for us too.
We are all called and gifted by God, and that’s what makes us special. God chose our gifts and it is important that we show our talents and be proud of them. The theme “We are all called and gifted by God” is also one of the four Synod 2020 themes, showing the importance of our reflection day together and the learning this as a parish group.
After this, we gathered together in a circle on the Prayer Balcony and reflected together on everything we had discussed. We also heard a reading about the importance of sharing our special gifts with the world as they are given to us by God. We also shared everything we were thankful for in our prayers, thanking God for our family, friends, parish and the opportunity to be there together.
As a young member of our parish, would you like to contribute to build our parish community and help it grow? Why don’t you ask about joining our music ministry or become an altar server? There are also other roles in church that you can help become involved in, such as reading in mass. You can use your superhero talent, your gift from God, and see our parish flourish!
