VICARIATE YOUTH LEADERS CONFERENCE Palo Archdiocesan Youth Commission Vicariate of Tacloban Our Lady of Guadalupe Parish, Tacloban

n City April 6, 2013, 9:00 a.m. Theme: Grateful to Christ, Celebrating the Faith and Carrying the Mission GRATEFUL TO CHRIST 1. First of all, I would like to thank the youth leaders of the Vicariate of Tacloban especially Fr. Manny Baybay for inviting me to this days event. Being here with you the youth leaders of the parish youth ministries, faith communities and renewal movements brings back to my mind very fond memories of the many years that I have been part of the youth ministry not only here in the Vicariate of Tacloban, but as well as in the Archdiocesan Youth Commission. Those were among the most enriching years of my young life. Without the experience, lessons and learning that I have gained in the parish youth ministry, I would not have become the person that I am now. 2. If I were to trace my own personal journey in the youth ministry, it would take me back to the year 1995, when Blessed Pope John Paul II visited the Philippines for the celebration of the 10th World Youth Day. That particular experience of the pope and the young people together made me realize of the mission that the youth has to undertake in the Church and in their community. That sea of five million people who gathered to see Peter in the flesh made me appreciate and understand that the creativity, selflessness and generous service of the youth were an important gift to the Church. 3. But in 1995, I was just 12 years old. That same year I entered the high school seminary. Four years of being a minor seminarian drew me even closer to the different activities of the youth ministry. Even or perhaps especially for us seminarians, the highlight of all those years of involvement with the youth ministry was the annual Summer Youth Camp, when the youth of the different parishes of the Archdiocese of Palo would gather for three days in learning, prayer and youthful celebration. During the Jubilee Year 2000, we were involved in the planning and celebration of the Archdiocesan Summer Youth Camp in Abuyog, Leyte and the local celebration of the Jubilee of the Youth. Even when I left the seminary, that did not stop my involvement with the youth ministry. In 2001, I was part of the organizing committee when the Archdiocese of Palo played host to the National Youth Day in Ormoc City. That same year, Msgr. Alex Opiniano, then parish priest of the Sacred Heart of Jesus Parish in Tacloban asked me to help organize the Parish Youth Council. Unlike the usual structure in most parish youth ministries the Parish Youth Council was a coordinating body composed of youth leaders from the barangay pastoral councils as well as faith communities and renewal movements, sharing amongst themselves their varied charisms, gifts and experiences. 4. All those years of active involvement in the youth ministry imprinted in me a strong belief in the capacity, talents and gifts of the young generation their giftedness and creativity, the selfless willingness to share their time, talents and at times treasure at the service of the parish community. During my years of involvement in the youth ministry, it was just the onset of the digital age. We used overhead projectors, not DLPs or LCD projectors. We recorded songs on cassette tapes, not CDs or DVDs. We didnt have the convenience of social media to set and organize meetings or special events. All that we relied on was the commitment of the youth leaders. We would visit youth leaders in their own homes or barangays, send out invitation letters to meetings and recollections and hoped that they would come. But, thanks be to God, they did come. We didnt have audio-visual presentations but we did skits and tableaus. Far from todays Facebook generation, ours didnt have to download from Youtube or copy mp3 files. We wrote the lyrics of songs on Manila paper or at times, on transparency sheets for use on the overhead projector. We raised our

own funds to finance the youth events that we organized for youth recollections, youth praise and assemblies. We were never perturbed, disturbed or discouraged by the fact that we didnt have money we knew we could raise the funds that we needed if we tried we collected newspapers, sang songs after Communion while taking a second collection and did caroling around the parish. 5. In many of our parish youth ministries, each one would have a gift to be shared with the group be it public speaking, writing, singing, playing a musical instrument, dancing and animating, drawing and painting. Each would be valued and fully appreciated for the gift of ones person; hence putting into concrete action, Saint Peters admonition to put ones gifts at the service of one another. Each one has a role to play, yet all had in their heart the good of all and the fulfillment of the goals that they shared. In the youth ministry, I seldom heard one complaining that the animators spent more time practicing than the music ministry or that the youth catechists have to spend more time teaching others than the rest. No one counted the measure of his or her own efforts compared to that of the others. All that mattered was that everyone was to able to give, to share of ones unique talent and skill in order to complete a common task. 6. With every passing year, we all grow up and then suddenly we realize that we are no longer the young persons that we once were. But all these years of our youth play a crucial role in shaping our hearts and minds, in becoming the person that we are. The experience of being valued teaches us to likewise see the value of the people around us. In turn, it creates in ones heart a longing to affirm that value, to serve, to find the fulfillment of our own lives in becoming person for others. But the person who does not see value in the skills and talents of others can easily be consumed by their own pride and ambition, yet end up with an unfulfilled and empty life. If there is something that I am most grateful for the many years that I had been part of the youth ministry is to learn and realize the value of the people around us, of how their individual strengths can complement our own inadequacies, so that by working together and pooling our talents, abilities and skills, there is no challenge that we cannot overcome, no goal that we cannot achieve. Isnt it not that when we are young, we are more trusting of others that is why we are willing to risk more in order to achieve even more important things? Yet when we grow older, we become more exacting, more calculating, and more selfish especially about what we will gain for ourselves and for our own benefit? 7. If there is one thing that I am most grateful to Christ for the many years of being in the youth ministry is learning to see the basic goodness of people and to see every hour of our day as an opportunity to do good to others. When we were in the youth ministry, we never cared about what we earned or gained for our own benefit. But more than any monetary reward, we gained lessons that taught us how live more meaningful lives. We built friendships that last until now. Even today, the friends that I met when I was in the youth ministry continue to give me sound advice or to pray for me whenever I need one. Even the attitude of doing things in the best way to organize and implement special activities and events has been influenced by my past experience of working on different youth activities in the parish. We learned how to work together regardless of our different family backgrounds, personality and character. Isnt it not that in the youth ministry, despite starting as strangers to one another, we always end up becoming a family where we feel accepted, cared and nurtured? 8. There is another thing that I am also very grateful about that is to learn how to live life as an experience of the faithfulness of God. At the moment, I cannot make pretenses about being a good and faithful Catholic. In many respects, I fall short of what good Catholic is called to be. Even now, I am far from perfect and probably until the day I die, I will be a work in progress. In the years that followed my involvement in the youth ministry, there were many times when I failed to be faithful to Christ and took on a wayward path away from God. Every day I continue to struggle to match Gods goodness to me and most of the time I fail. Yet, those years of being in the youth ministry, the lessons I learned and the experience I had never fail to remind me not to despair about Gods mercy, that even when we sin and

become unfaithful, God remains true and faithful to us so much so that every time we search for God, He is already searching for us, patiently waiting to bring us home. 9. The question is how do we will live this sense of gratefulness to Christ as the young generation in the Church today? Gratefulness, by definition, reflects an attitude of gratitude, of thankfulness, of giving thanks, of thanksgiving. In the life of the Church, we find no other more meaningful and powerful image of thanksgiving than the Eucharist. In the Greek language, the word Eucharist means thanksgiving. In the Holy Eucharist, the humble gifts of bread and wine are taken, blessed, broken, poured and shared to be our sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving. Indeed, in a similar manner, we Christians are called to this life of gratefulness, of thankfulness; in which our humble lives are taken into the very hands of God, blessed by him to be a blessing to others, with lives broken and poured so that through human frailty and weakness we can show the power of God; and finally so that all that we are, all that we are capable of doing are selflessly and willingly shared with others. 10. First, like the humble gifts of bread and wine, God takes our own humble lives to himself. He calls us in the ordinariness of our human condition. Have you ever asked why most of the young people who are in the youth ministry come from middle class families, those who live very ordinary lives? When I was in the youth ministry, I often asked why God didnt bring those who are rich, talented, the good looking and beautiful and the intelligent ones into the youth ministry. Maybe if there were more rich people, then fundraising wouldnt be a problem. If all those in the youth ministry were all talented and intelligent, then we wouldnt have a problem with speakers, facilitators, animators and band players. Maybe if there were more good-looking and beautiful young people in church, then, they would attract others to come too. But God has chosen you and me. He has chosen us inspite and despite of our own weaknesses, sinfulness and frailty. But he has chosen us not only for our own worth, but more importantly because of his own goodness. Have you ever wondered what brought you to the youth ministry? Have you ever asked why me, why you, despite of the many others who are probably more talented, intelligent, more good-looking or beautiful than us? He has chosen us you and me because he loves us. In his love and goodness, God has chosen us and took us into his own hands. 11. Second, God has blessed us. In the liturgy of the Church, we hear the priest praying You (God) have no need of our praise. Yet the desire to thank is itself your gift. Our prayer of thanksgiving adds nothing to your greatness, but makes us grow in your grace through Jesus Christ our Lord. Like in the Eucharist during which Christ has not only taken into his hands ordinary bread and wine, he has also blessed it. In the same manner, after God us taken us from our ordinary lives, he has blessed us. All throughout the time that we are in the youth ministry, we have nourished by the Word of God and the sacraments. Many times have we been to activities of prayer and worship, but sometimes, many of us struggle with our prayer life. Even I, after many years of involvement in the youth ministry, not to mention my seminary background, have struggled with my prayer life. There was a time that I havent been to confession, and even to Sunday Mass. There was this feeling of emptiness, or boredom and sometimes of overfamiliarity. This is the challenge that a life of gratefulness calls to do to see God working in our lives, to see his blessing sustaining us everyday of our lives. God does not need our prayers. It is us who need him. We need his goodness in our lives, so that by a life of prayer nourished by the sacraments, by God blessing us in order to make us grow in his grace, we will begin to bear witness to the power of God working in our lives. 12. Third, like the Eucharistic bread, our lives are broken, pained and hurts. In the many years of being in the youth ministry, I have often noticed why many of those who come to the youth ministry live lives broken by poverty, family problems, struggle with drugs and other vices, issues in human sexuality. At a very difficult period of my life, I questioned why God has to allow pain and hurts, problems and difficulties to those people who have given up their time, skills and resources in his service. Among the biggest problems that I have encountered in the youth ministry is when you come to suddenly know that

someone you worked with and trusted has gotten pregnant. I know you have been into this situation, when young people who are in the youth ministry become teenage mothers and fathers. There is a strong feeling of betrayal, frustration and failure, not to mention the blame and criticism that follows. Why does God allow these pain and hurt to happen in our lives? Does he allow it to test us and our faith in him? Does God use it as a measure of our love for him? But our God is a good God. He is the God who is love and like the broken bread, he allows pain and hurt to come into our lives in order to experience more fully his power and goodness. Isnt it that we tend to forget God when we are happy, when we have money, when we are having a good time? He reminds us that it is in our weakness that we are strong. When we are hurt and pain, we learn to experience Gods healing. When we are we ak, we find strength in God. It is these imperfections and weakness in our own lives when we allow a loving God to mold us into our full potentials. 13. Fourth, like the Eucharistic bread, our lives are meant to be shared in service to others. It is not just that we feel grateful to Christ this feeling must bear fruit in the life that we live now and in the future. In this Year of Faith, in this Diamond Jubilee of the Archdiocese of Palo, if we the youth are to live our lives with renewed gratefulness to Christ, then our lives must mirror the same goodness that we have received from God. What we freely receive from God, we must give freely to others. Like the Eucharist, we share our lives with others for the building up of the Body of Christ, the Church in strengthening our parishes and faith communities. By living our lives of Christian service, we should be like the evangelists who will write the experience of Christ in our own lives, of experiencing the fidelity, the faithfulness of God and celebrating his loving and eternal providence. But far from simple works of charity or philanthropy, our involvement in the youth ministry must be rooted in our Christian vocation. Our words and deeds must bear witness to Christ. Whatever profession or state of life we may find ourselves in the future we must not cease to live our vocation as children of God, and as friends of Christ. 14. The important challenge therefore remains for all of us for you and for me alike to live this gratefulness to Christ in the ordinary circumstances of our daily lives, in our relationship with God and with others and in the Christian witness of our own personal and professional lives. Taken, blessed, broken, poured and shared - living this gratefulness for you means becoming youth ministers not only in your parishes but should also include bringing Christ also into your homes, schools and communities. The youth ministry should not be confined to the parish but should permeate your everyday lives now and in the future. 15. As I said at the onset of my sharing, I am very certain that I would not be the person I am today, if not for Gods loving providence in leading me to the youth ministry of the Archdiocese of Palo. This is probably what Blessed Pope John Paul II meant when he called our youthful years as the period of apprenticeship in life. I will always be grateful to God for allowing me to be part of his work in the youth apostolate. Therefore I encourage all of you to consider these years of your involvement in the youth ministry as a time for you to learn how to live life to the fullest as persons for others, as brothers and sisters in the family of God. The lessons you will learn here, the friendships you will build and the abilities and skills that will gain will all shape you to become a much better person in the future. 16. Finally, living out this gratefulness to Christ should inspire us to pray for one ano ther even more, without ceasing; to create this fellowship of prayer. As Christians, our lives should be anchored on prayer and we cannot claim to a life of Christian witness without a life of prayer. Let us pray, not only for our own selves and our own needs, but also for one another so that we may always be aware of Gods saving help in our lives. Let us pray for our Church and her pastors. Let us pray for our nation and our leaders. Let us pray that our own lives, yours and mine, will bear a stronger Christian witness especially in this Year of Faith.