Youth Speak News

VICTORIA - On Nov. 27, students at the University of Victoria held a day-long vigil to pray for the rights of the unborn.

From 9 a.m. to 6 p.m., about 15 students gathered throughout the day, rosaries in hand, with at least four people present every hour.

It’s the sort of public display of faith that is rare on the University of Victoria campus though.

TORONTO - Kristine Soufian wanted to help people who needed it the most. So she took action, initiating the Ethiopia Summer Experience.

The main focus of the volunteering initiative is to offer an ESL (English as a Second Language) program to both elementary and high school students in Gambo, Ethiopia, over the summer. The program is one branch of the Cor Unum Africa Foundation.

I’ve come to realize we can learn some of life’s greatest lessons from the poor.  

Last spring, I travelled with six other students to Cuernavaca, Mexico, with Global Connections on an educational immersion trip organized by the Canadian Catholic Campus Ministry. For 12 days I lived the social justice teachings of the Church through hands on experience. I toured some of the poorest parts of the city, volunteered at a compost centre and served breakfasts to underprivileged school children.

As a Catholic and a pro-life supporter, it was disappointing to hear that the Carleton University Students’ Association (CUSA) banned our campus pro-life club. Carleton Lifeline lost club status because the student union said being anti-abortion violates the university’s anti-discrimination policy. In order to receive student union funding and recognition on campus, the club must become pro-choice.

The irony is obvious.

I am involved in the University of Saskatchewan’s Newman Centre, a Catholic student group supported by the diocese. The Centre began in 1926 both to spread Cardinal Newman’s message of the integration of faith and reason in education and to create a refuge for Catholic students in a time of hatred and suspicion towards Catholics.

Natalie Achonwa graduated from a Hamilton, Ont., high school to the University of Notre Dame and went right into the record book.

The budding basketball star is the first international player to suit up for Notre Dame’s varsity basketball team in the 34-year history of the women’s program. And, although she just turned 18 last week, she is already a two-year veteran of the Canadian women’s senior national team.

Markham, Ont. - One teenager doesn’t attend Mass regularly because he finds it boring. Another prefers sleeping in on Sunday. Whatever the excuse for skipping Mass, we’ve heard it before. But some parishes in Toronto are offering a solution: youth Masses.

Grade 12 student Isaac Peiris attends youth mass because it speak to issues he’s experiencing while avoiding the generation gap sometimes found at traditional Masses.

I have been the youth ministry co-ordinator at my parish for the past year and it has been an exciting journey.

Running a youth ministry program can be daunting — I want everything to go according to plan. But too often I find myself being the one to make sure the youth leaders are listening to a talk or reminding them what activity is coming up next. And before any leader realizes they failed to do something, I have taken care of it.

TORONTO - Mitchelle D’Souza has always loved to draw. In fact, she recalls being only five or six years old and getting in trouble for drawing in class instead of paying attention. Now 27, the York University information technology graduate is putting her artistic talents to use. Last August, D’Souza launched an online graphic novel, entitled The Fatima Story.

The comic is an adaptation of the story of the three children, Lucia, Francisco and Jacinta, who witnessed apparitions of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Fatima, Portugal, during the First World War.