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By Eric Connolly
Fifty-seven motivated young people
gathered in June for the 2011 Catholic Youth
Coalition Leadership Camp at Legendary
Lodge on Salmon Lake.
The June 12-17 gathering with a theme
of virtues and vices, similar to the summerlong
theme for the regular camp sessions at
Legendary, was a springboard for the year’s
CYC events and a pathway to strengthen
fellowship and leadership.
Along with the Masses, reconciliation,
hikes and games that are part of life at Legendary
Lodge, participants in Leadership
Camp devoted additional time to catechesis
presentations and small-group activities designed
to build skills. They identified virtues
they wish to reflect in daily life, and then
spent time in small groups, discussing which
virtues they chose, and why.
“I chose joy, and it’s a challenge, but a
good challenge,” said participant Nina Hill
of Our Lady of the Valley Parish in Helena.
Cody Tredik of St. Francis of Assisi
Parish in Hamilton said these discussions
strengthen the participants’ ability to help
one another as they strive for virtue in how
they live.
Another activity new to Leadership
Camp, and to Legendary Lodge, was a challenge
course with ropes strung, at low
height, among trees. Participants tested their
ability to balance and progress through the
course, an exercise intended to boost problem
solving and team cohesion.
Important aspects of Leadership Camp
include the discernment in filling the four
officer positions on the CYC Board. Officers
were chosen on June 16 after a morning
session of prayer and song, and the silent
raising of hands to indicate which people
should serve as officers.
Tredik is the new president. He is a
Hamilton High School student whose activities
include having collaborated on a gritty
public service announcement titled “Just
This Once,” delivering a message against
drug abuse.
The CYC Board’s new vice president for
operations is Emily Rapkoch of St. William
Parish in Shelby. She recently led outreach
in which the board wrote personal letters of
encouragement and thanks to each priest in
the Diocese of Helena. A letter also went to
Pope Benedict XVI and brought a response
from the apostolic nuncio.
Blake Yarnall of St. John the Baptist
Parish in Frenchtown is the vice president
for marketing. The Frenchtown High School
student sings as a tenor, for which he has
won all-state honors.
Hill is the vice president for communications.
Last year in connection with CYC,
she started the “From Youth, For Youth”
scholarship fund, which collected $576 for
young people needing financial assistance
to participate in diocesan Office of Youth
and Young Adult Ministry activities. The
money came from teens who each contributed
$5 at meetings of the CYC Board.
For all of the officers, home parishes
have been strong sources of support, said
Doug Tooke, Youth and Young Adult Ministry
coordinator for the Diocese of Helena.
The time at Legendary Lodge was “a
great week to just grow in faith and grow together,”
Tredik said as he prepared to leave
the camp.
Its sessions, which were led by Legendary
Lodge counselors and by youth ministers
and volunteers from around the
Diocese of Helena, lay a foundation for
work the CYC Board will undertake
through a number of events in the coming
year.
They include the Junior High Rally,
which is scheduled for Nov. 5 in Kalispell
and draws the diocese’s middle-school
youth for a retreat day with speakers and
music, and the CYC Convention, set for
April 20-22 in Helena. High school convention-
goers hear speakers, participate in
workshops and worship in a Cathedral of St.
Helena Mass celebrated by Bishop George
Leo Thomas. Also on the events calendar is
the annual Kickball Tournament, May 20 in
Deer Lodge. The double-elimination tournament
is a multigenerational event.
Published in The Montana Catholic Online, Volume 27, No. 7, July 15, 2011.
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