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In March our CYO youth participated in the 30-hour famine. The planning began many months ago and we all owe a BIG thank you to Cyndi and Alainna DeRee for all of the time they spent coordinating this event for our CYO. We had 21 youth who spent the weekend fasting and doing service projects. On Friday night, the youth worked in Sr. Margaret’s yard and on the playground cleaning up dead leaves, picking up sticks, etc. Later that evening they went to church and walked the Stations of the Cross. After a meal of pizza at midnight, the youth went to the gym and played basketball and volleyball. The next morning Fr. Leland came over for Morning Prayer with the youth. The youth then canvassed the neighborhoods around St. Anne’s collecting non-perishable items as a scavenger hunt, getting points for certain types or brands of food. The team that had the most points got to eat first on Sunday morning. On Saturday afternoon, we put together 90 care packages which will be distributed to people who have family members in the critical care units at Via Christi. They also got to play football outside and we were very thankful for the beautiful weather that we had so the youth could be outside. We had a young woman come and talk to the youth about her possibility of joining the religious life and her experiences in the military. That evening we and many parishioners watched the movie “Demographic Winter” followed by a group discussion. On Sunday morning, we went to 8:30 Mass together to break their fast, followed by a delicious breakfast cooked by the parents. Some parishioners commented that at Mass the kids looked tired and must have stayed up all night. In fact the kids went to sleep around midnight because they felt weak and tired from not eating. They complained of headaches, no energy and could only focus on the next time they would get to eat. They truly experienced what millions of people live with everyday. The youth who participated are Matt DeRee, Garrett DeRee, Jerilyn DeRee, Bryce Jarvis, Clint Palmer, Courtney Waters, Joe Traffas, Stacy Hartman, Jordan Gleason, Nicole Goetz, Shelby Waters, John Morgan, Tyler Winslow, Luke Witte, Bryan Cox, Kali Stickney, Elizabeth Ho, Don Ho, Robert Sullivan, Felicia Sullivan, and Hollie Newell. We would like to give the adults who volunteered their time a huge “THANK YOU” because this weekend couldn’t happen without them giving of their time and energy. The adult volunteers were: Tracy Winslow, Cyndi DeRee, Janet Goetz, Kay Palmer, Rachel Denning, Cindy DeRee, Rhonda Gleason, Linda Waters, John Waters, Greg DeRee, Tom Traffas, Alainna DeRee, Kay Palmer, Kelly Shidler, Melanie and Carl Witte, Joyce Hartman, Caren Newell. The youth gathered close to 800 non-perishable items for the St. Vincent de Paul Society and collected over $1,000, which will also be donated to the St. Vincent de Paul Society. We would like to thank everyone for their prayers and support during this weekend. We would also like to thank everyone for their donations of food and money because this will make a difference in so many people’s lives. We also had one youth and a parent participate in the Diocesan Youth Conference last weekend, Courtney Waters and her mom, Linda. It was a great weekend, even though the schedule changed due to the weather. We had several of the high school youth help with the Living Stations of the Cross the last Friday of Lent. It was an awesome experience and the kids are really making it their own. The high school youth who participated were Garrett DeRee, John Morgan, Nicole Goetz, Felicia Sullivan, and Bryce Jarvis. We would also like to thank Alainna DeRee and Tory Winslow for their guidance on this project. These youth, along with several middle school youth, gave up time every Sunday for a month to practice the stations. |
March 14, 2010
