Monroe Vicariate cooperation leads to huge growth in participation in annual Ohio-based event
Detroit — This year, 87 students and 13 chaperones from parishes in the Monroe Vicariate crowded onto buses to make the trek to Steubenville, Ohio.
The Steubenville Youth Conferences, known nationwide for their lively music, public testimonies, motivational speakers, adoration and fellowship among young Catholics, give young adults ages 14 to 18 a chance to grow in friendship and faith.
Nancy Dietrich began organizing the trip for the Monroe Vicariate just eight years ago. The first year, just 18 students and three chaperones attended.
“I told the kids that if we wanted to fill up a bus, they had to go out and invite friends and become witnesses,” Dietrich said. “The next year we had 56 students.”
Joyfully surprised at the rapid growth of the trip, Dietrich takes it as a sign that the number of students wanting and needing the experience is increasing. It’s also a sign of the collaboration among parishes in the vicariate, she said.
“We are different than most groups who attend because we do not represent one youth group, one high school, or one parish,” Dietrich said. “This is Together in Faith working, in my opinion.”
“As we’re growing, the group is getting closer,” explained Dietrich. Even though most of the students come from 12 of the 14 Monroe Vicariate parishes, the return students help welcome newcomers, she said. “When we put them into small groups, we mix them up so they all get to interact.”
Dietrich, who works in the archdiocesan Office of Priestly Vocations, said it’s impossible to go to the conference and not be changed or touched by God’s grace. “We ask the kids to open their hearts and have the experience.”
With that experience, the students are exposed to the beauty of religious vocations and the importance of evangelization. Three of the chaperones were seminarians from the Archdiocese of Detroit this year, as well as one newly ordained priest, Fr. Patrick Gonyeau.
Katherine Tibai, starting her senior year in high school this fall, attended the youth conference for the forth time. To increase her growth in faith, she applied to participate in the Franciscan LEAD program at the conference, which is “geared towards teenagers who are interested in learning how to life more Christ-centered lives,” she said.
Tibai said her prayer life thrived under the influence of the LEAD program. “Before LEAD, my prayer life was almost non-existent, other than the family rosary,” she said. “Now I’ve learned that prayer can also be composed in the heart. I don’t even have to say any words, just to open up my heart and be willing to let the Holy Spirit in.”
The most difficult part of the weekend for Tibai is the return trip. “It’s hard going home,” she admitted.
For some students, the conference is a welcome reprieve from daily routine and a chance to make new resolutions to live a faith-filled life.
Blaise Eby just graduated high school and says in his fourth year at the conference he found strength and trained for his everyday faith life.
“My first year, I expected the ‘boring’ routine of Mass,” he said. “You know, the hum-drum, everyday kind of feeling.” But then, Eby said his faith life went from being dry to abundant and he was challenged to make a change in his life.
“I know that coming back, you have to expect a restructuring of your faith life,” he said. “You get off the emotional feeling of God, and you rely on the intellectual, what you know.”
Eby praises the youth conference as a soul-searching, life-changing experience. “Steubenville will be the vehicle for you to find Christ,” he said in his reflection. “He loves you with a deep love.”
“Are you a sinner? Are you a murderer? Do you have a ‘past?’ He loves you,” Eby’s reflection stated.
Carolyn Gessner said she struggled with forgiveness. “During adoration, everyone was on their knees, crying out to God whether it was for forgiveness or just thanks. I invited the Holy Spirit into my heart and told God, ‘Alright, I’m giving it all to You.’”
Gessner said she started crying upon realizing that God is lovingly waiting for us to ask for his help. “I will no longer try to do this or go through this life alone,” she resolved. “God is always there.”
Why these young people give up a summer weekend to go talk about God and spend a lot of time in church?
“I go so I can grow deeper in my relationship with God,” said Tibai. “I want to better connect with him.”
Another student, Mitchell Couturier, said he truly found God for the first time at Steubenville. “This experience was like nothing I’ve had before, and by the end of the weekend, I had opened my heart and had found and understood the love of Jesus. This truly was a weekend to remember.”
Eby takes it as a mission to reform his everyday life. “I see it as a challenge to go through my life with God’s eyes and try to go throughout my life and work with them to become like Christ,” he said. “I want to proclaim God’s word through my actions.”
