This weekend is WORLD YOUTH SUNDAY – a unique opportunity to celebrate the role and significance of young people in the Catholic Church.
There will be a second collection at parishes across the Diocese to support the work of the Brentwood Catholic Youth Service, as well as the opportunity to hear more about their work.
The Brentwood Catholic Youth Service and Walsingham House at Abbotswick offer retreats, events and opportunities for thousands of young people across Essex and East London every year, as well as working with catechists, youth leaders and school chaplains.
Your donation will help to provide training, equipment and financial aid for young people to attend pilgrimages such as Lourdes.
Please continue to pray for the ministry of young people. Thank you.
Find out more at www.bcys.net , searching @brentwoodcys or if you are able to, you can donate online at www.bcys.net/donate
Read the BCYS message for World Youth Sunday here:
As well as being the Feast of Christ the King, this weekend is also World Youth Sunday, and the theme this year is ‘Let Your Kingdom Come’. This theme resonates deeply with the mission of young people in the Catholic Church today. It is a call to action, inviting them to be active participants in building God’s Kingdom here on earth. It challenges them to reflect on how they can embody Christ’s love, justice and peace in their daily lives, and how they can be instruments of God’s will in a world that is in dire need of hope and renewal.
The work of the BCYS encourages young people to become active participants in their faith, helping them to build relations with others and to strengthen and deepen their relationship with God. Throughout the year there are a range events taking place for young people from across the diocese.
This summer 130 young people and leaders travelled with the BCYS to Lourdes – the biggest number since the pandemic. It was a week of service as the young people assisted with the main diocesan pilgrimage. Throughout the week there was a feeling of joy and hope.
Last month, at the end of October, 80 young people and leaders attended the annual ‘Youth Gather’ at Essex Outdoors on Mersea Island, a mixed weekend of exciting activities like an adventure course and zip wire, as well as inspiring workshops, times of prayer and Mass.
There is a regular Youth Mass every month at Brentwood Cathedral, where around a hundred young people from different schools and parishes come together. The evening begins with a workshop or prayer sessions before moving into Mass, and as with most good youth events there is pizza!
As well as these events, the BCYS also run other regular events throughout the year: the Rite of Acceptance for those young people being confirmed in their parishes at Pentecost; training days for Catechists; regular formation and networking sessions with school chaplains, and all of this alongside our beautiful Diocesan Youth retreat centre ‘Walsingham House at Abbotswick’, where for the first time in two years there is a resident youth team who run retreats for young people from around the diocese.
In order for the BCYS to continue offering a variety of opportunities for young people it needs your help. The BCYS aim to support young people to be active in their faith and become young leaders in the Church. Events are either free or highly subsidised, which means that collections like the one on World Youth Sunday are essential for the ongoing work of the BCYS. Donations will go directly to training young leaders, providing new equipment, and helping to provide bursaries so no-one in financial hardship misses out. Whether you can donate or not, please pray for the BCYS, Walsingham House and for young people across the diocese.
To any young people listening – think about getting involved with the BCYS, please come along to an event – you will always receive a warm welcome and it is a great way to make new friends to share your faith with other young Catholics.
