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The Office of Youth and Young Adult
Ministry embarked on a pilot project to
increase justice awareness and apply
Catholic social teaching. With funds from
Son Light, the Annual Catholic Appeal
(formerly Diocesan Offertory Program)
and a grant from the Foundation for the
Diocese of Helena, the inaugural diocesan
Justice Outreach Project began June 28.
Fifty youth and adults from across the
Diocese of Helena traveled to Browning,
Mont., for a week of cultural immersion,
justice awareness and some hard work,
said diocesan youth minister Doug Tooke.
Tooke said the four young adult leaders
– Sean Courtney, Kelly Ruby, Mike
d’Esterre and Lauren Vogl – were outstanding
in their service to the youth.
From painting the parish fellowship
space to rebuilding barbed wire fence, the
week was filled with taxing labor and
exhausted, but smiling, faces. “The youth
walked away from the experience with
transformed hearts and a keen awareness
of our brothers and sisters in the Catholic
faith,” said Tooke.
Each day was filled with prayer, service
and different local endeavors. Prayer
communities from Little Flower Parish in
Browning hosted the group each night
with meal hospitality and a cultural lesson.
Tooke said the youth filled both their
hundred-page journals and their stomachs
with the overwhelming spiritual teaching
and incredible food provided.
It did not take long for the group to
realize the primary focus of the week was
not the service work, but the opportunity
to learn more about a culture that has
blessed the Catholic faithful for hundreds
of years, he said.
“Friendships were born and the beginning
of a long relationship of education
and service was kindled for years to
come,” Tooke explained. Each year, the
Office of Youth and Young Adult Ministry
will host a Justice and Outreach Project in
Browning to further develop an integration
of social justice in adolescent faith formation
and help nurture the local consciousness
of the young faithful.
Next year’s JOP is scheduled
for June 27-July 2.
Published in The Montana Catholic Online, Volume 25, No. 8, August 21, 2009.
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