Reflection on Sping Retreat by Casey

The weekend of March 5-7 the saint Michael high school youth, along with St. Rita and St. Elizabeth Ann Seton, went up to Brown County, Indiana for a spring retreat. There were a total of thirty four people, youth and adult leaders attending this retreat. The Youth Group heads up there twice a year for retreat.
The main idea of this retreat was One Love, and we had talks about the different types of love and how to show this love. What all I got out of this was that there are different types of love, and different ways to express all of these. There is a difference between the type of love you share with friends, family, God, and those you care about. One way to show love to God is by service and worship. The Sunday the group took part in a service project around camp which was raking the gravel that had been forced off the road this winter. This was a great way to give back to the camp.
Another part of this retreat was small groups, which is where, after each talk, we were broken apart into smaller groups to reflect on what we had just heard. These were times where you could open up and give your feelings to the group. Another thing that the small groups did was write a prayer. This was an interesting chance that we got to talk to God in our own words.
After all of this I feel that I am obligated to share what spoke to me the most. This had to be one of the talks which was about loving your enemies. This individual talk really spoke to me because it was saying that life is too short to hold grudges, you need to learn to love then and forgive. In my life I have had a few experiences in this but I never really knew how to handle them.
Another thing that I truly enjoyed was going to the campfire. This was a fun time where you could get to know the people around you and have a chance to look around and admire what all God has given us. At the campfire we took out the guitars and played, sang, and enjoyed some amazing s’mores.
To sum this entire trip up I would like to say that this experience was an eye opener, and a chance to get closer to God. I feel more relaxed and refreshed when the retreat is over. I feel that my relationship with god is closer and that I understand more of what he truly is. This was again an amazing experience and I am planning on attending every other retreat that I have a chance to attend.

Giving a Life to Save a Life

Back on August 24th, I received the best early brithday present anyone could wish for; my father recieved a liver transplant. After the initial shock of the miracle of modern medicine wore off, I've had a chance to really think about the whole situation. On the night that my family and I were celebrating my dad being given a new chance at life, there was a family grieving the loss of their loved one. It might be easy to dismiss the thought and get lost in our celebration, but as time has gone on, I have spent a lot of time thinking about that person and the decision they made to give at least one other person a chance at life again.

The whole situation has given me a new view not only on life itself, but also on the act that Christ did 2000 years ago in giving't himself for us. Just like I never physcially met the person who gave their life so my dad could live his, I have never had the real person who was Jesus of Nazareth who lived 2000 years ago physcially in front of me. I will never get to physcially say thank you to either, nor will I ever really know what they looked like. What I do know though is the love and the thought that both of these people showed in how they lived and more importantly how they died. I now understand what it means when the idea of giving your life for a friends is spoken of in John 15:13.

My question for you this blog is could you do it? Could you lay down your life for your friends? How about someone you didn't know? How about your enemies? This is exactly the love that Christ showed all of us 2000 years ago. So before the next time you wonder if the love of Christ is still around us, know that God's love is here in transplants, in warm smiles, in embraces from friends in time of sadness and in much,much more.

May God smile upon you and your family.

Peace,


Aaron Frazita

Who will you be this year?

As summer is coming to a close, I've been working on getting all of the summer pictures up on the website and cleaning up the remnants of youth Getting Off the Couch all summer and going on various trips and seminars. Its sad to see the summer go and our friends who graduated leave us and go to their different schools, but it is an essential and necessary part of life. The new school year gives us all a chance to start over again in many different ways: new teachers, new classmates, new teams, new social groups and even new schools for some.

My question for you as all of this opportunity approaches is who do you want to be this year? Is there a group you've always wanted to be a part of that you never have for some reason or a sport that you always wanted to try but never have? Maybe you've always wanted to try an instrument or pick up paiting or drawing but have always been afraid? Whatever it is for you, challenge yourself to really think about and be intentional about the person that you are becoming and that you want to become as the year goes on.

Know that we are all praying for you and that whoever you are becoming, you are still and always have been a child of God.

May God continue to smile upon you all,

Fraz

What's Your Mission?

Yesterday was Pentecost Sunday, commonly referred to as the birthday of the Church. The focus for Pentecost is mission. When most of us think of mission, we think of going away to different places to help fix things or to tell people about Christ. In reality, the biggest mission call that we have is how we live our lives. St. Francis is attributed with saying, "Preach the Gospel at all times, when necessary, use words." Its important that we remember that we have to walk to the talk. If we say we are a people of love and compassion, then we have to show that to everyone we meet. So the questions that I would challenge you to think about in the wake of Pentecost are these:

How have you shown love lately to those close to you lately?
How have you shown love to those you do not know very well?
How have you shown love to those you do not get along with?

In the immortal words of the Beatles, "All you need is love." How are you going to be love to all you meet in this summer of love?

God is love,
Fraz

What's your I-Pod on?

As I sit in my office begining this adventure of blogging, it is kind of funny that the theme song from Star Wars should come onto my I-pod as it shuffles from song to song. It makes me think about the idea that many times in life we bounce from thing to thing in our lives on our own shuffle pattern without really trying to take the time to organize things into a playlist that makes sense.

As summer is approaching and we are given a chance to take time to step back and look at things, I would challenge you to take time to think about what you want to be as your favorites in your life. What is it that are the things you want to make a priority this summer? Is it friends, family, sports, vacations?

Summer is a time of rest and relaxation so why not take some time out of the calendar this summer to work on your relationship wiht God?