Go once, and you will want to go again

By Tanya Connor

“I think everybody who is secure in their faith – or isn’t secure in their faith – needs to go.”

Leeann Hansson, a youth minister at St. Peter Parish in Northbridge, was talking about the Steubenville East youth conference held at the University of Rhode Island in Kingston last weekend. It was a first for her and the parish, she said.

“The kids actually said, ‘We’ve got to get everyone to come next year,’” she said. It is good for them to see they’re not alone, as 2,700 teenagers from the broader area gathered to grow in faith.

This year, for the first time, Life Teen hosted Steubenville East. Life Teen is known primarily for its program for high schoolers, used by more than 1,200 Catholic parishes around the world, says the website www.lifeteen.com. St. Peter’s is one of those.

This was the conference’s second year at URI. It was previously held at the National Shrine of Our Lady of LaSalette in Attleboro and hosted by the Missionaries of Our Lady of La Salette.

Deacon Eduardas V. Meilus, director of the Worcester Diocese’s Office for Youth Ministry, said he thought this was the first year since Steubenville East started here that the Youth Ministry office also took a group to the place where the youth conferences originated, Franciscan University in Steubenville, Ohio.

What started there in 1976 has branched out into 19 conferences around the United States and Canada, which serve more than 36,000 youth and their leaders, according to the website www.franciscanyouth.com. Local youth and adult chaperones have frequented the closest one: Steubenville East.

But youth clamored “to experience it where it all began,” Deacon Meilus said. So this summer nine adults and 26 youth attended that conference.

The welcome they got from Franciscan University students “made such a positive impact on me that I’m planning on bringing a group again next year,” he said.

“They were so filled with joy,” Patti Taylor, religious education/youth ministry coordinator at St. Anna Parish in Leominster, said of the college students. “It just added so much more. I’ve been to LaSalette. I’ve been to URI. I would definitely go back to Ohio next year.”

“It was a very different experience from what I got at URI,” said her daughter Michaela, 16, of Sacred Heart-St. Catherine of Sweden Parish in Worcester, highlighting the high-fives and thanks the college students gave teenagers.

“It’s so hard to come back, because everybody there wants to be there,” and worshipers need not fear raising their hands in praise, she said. Back home, not everybody accepts that, but one can pray for strength not to shy away from it and keep in touch with friends who were there, she said.

The Steubenville conferences include Mass, confession, talks, music, small group sharing and an experience of adoration youth find especially powerful, as a priest carries a monstrance bearing a consecrated Host among them. This year’s theme is “The Word Became Flesh” (Jn 1:14).

Randy Raus, Life Teen Inc. president/CEO, said Life Teen, as a ministry partner with Franciscan University, has hosted Steubenville West and Steubenville Atlanta. Life Teen is about leading teenagers closer to Christ and “these conferences do that in a very powerful way,” he said. Life Teen plans to host Steubenville East next year and is considering whether or not to hold it at URI, he said.

There are pros and cons to both URI and LaSalette Shrine, said Maurice Vautour, who helps with conference security and is a member of Our Lady of the Holy Rosary Parish in Gardner. The shrine gave the experience of being on holy ground, he said. But despite the differences, “we’re still doing the same thing.”

He said he and others meet monthly for nearly a year to prepare for each conference. He sees the fruits.

“You see them come in Friday night and they’re searching,” he said of the youth. “You see it Sunday morning in their smiles. You see the transformation from Friday to Sunday.”

“I saw the transformation in some of our own kids,” said Terese Meilus, who works with her husband in the youth ministry office. At the diocesan youth day Oct. 23, which is modeled on Steubenville conferences, “the energy continues on,” she said.

“I’ve seen the transformation in the young people; it touches their hearts,” echoed Deacon Richard C. Martino, of St. Rose of Lima Parish in Northborough, who brought youth and adults from there and St. Bernadette Parish in town. He said it is a challenge for the church to fan the flame of faith, which would be done with adoration at St. Bernadette’s on Sunday night and service projects through St. Rose of Lima.

The Northborough contingent and Worcester’s youth ministry office each brought more than 30 people to the conference and St. Joseph Parish in Charlton brought 22, according to conference contact person, Kori Baker.

Zach Wehner, 16, of St. Bernadette’s, said he learned one’s heart is like a fist – you need to open it to let God and others in.

“It was amazing,” said Matthew Goldstein, 14, of St. Peter’s. He said he’s trying to figure out what he got out of the conference and why he feels different now. One night he wrote six pages in a journal, stopped only by lights-out time, he said.
“I’m definitely going next year,” he said.