Mad Rant Week Part 1 – Selling Out Our Catholic Youth

Last year at this time of year I began to blog regularly as I started my new workout regimen.  I really got into it and was very consistent for a while.  Then Facebook happened and I stopped writing.  Seems that my curiosity (or nosiness) was stronger than my will to write.  Since then I have found myself thinking of things that i should write down, and yet I never found the time, energy, desire, or the plain old wherewithall to do so.  Well, I finally found something to write about.  in fact I have a bunch of things I want to write about because they are on my mind, and I never want to forget how I felt at this moment in time about these particular topics.  Hopefully these are things that will inspire me to change not only me but to go out and change the things I don’t like in this world and improve the things that I do.  I’m sick of just sitting around and doing NADA on my big butt (which has gotten bigger again since I stopped exercising… that’s changing today too…).  So today I share the first of many thoughts i have regarding certain topics.  Hopefully after my rants, I will begin with some more lighthearted writing later on.

On Sunday, I received some sad news.  I was informed that the Archdiocese of Miami Youth Center was up for sale.  This retreat facility and gathering place for the Catholic Youth of Miami has had a special place in my heart for a long time.  It is there where I went through the Encuentro Juveniles nearly 20 years ago (September 8-10, 1989).  It is where I went to the “youth and young adult group” related to this Catholic Movement for 3 and half years every Monday (and many times Wednesdays, too) after that retreat.  It is where I went through my leadership seminars (Liderazgo) to learn more about being a young Catholic Leader walking in the footsteps of Christ’s disciples.  It is where we held retreats for both SpiritAlive and CrossRoads retreats when I was coordinating those respective groups.  It is where we ran Archdiocesan retreats for Young Adults, in particular the “Remember” retreat that I helped create with Frank Villaronga (former head of Young Adults for the archdiocese), and a host of other great creative people involved in YAMI (Young Adult Ministry Institute).  Dania used to do the St. Brendan Encounters there when she was Campus Minsiter there.  And it is the place that I spent almost a full two weeks of my life working on when it was hit hard during Hurricane Andrew in 1992.  This place truly has a special place in my heart.

As sad as I was that the place was closing down, it made me sadder when I realized that the Encuentros Juveniles would be losing their home, and their meeting location, leaving them with no place to meet.  I figured that this is just a reality that existed and that we’d just have to learn to deal with it until they found a new home.  I’d always hoped that my kids would be able to experience similar moments to the ones that I enjoyed so many years ago at that same location, but I guess things sometimes have to change.

Then, I heard the rest of the news.  It seems that the Archdiocese had also decided to sell the Madonna retreat center also, and worse yet, they had decided to close down the Pastoral Youth program in the Archdiocese.  This came as a shock to me.  Now it didn’t seem like if the Archdiocese was making a tough financial decision.  No. To me it started to look like an attack on the youth of our Church. 

I have a hard time understanding why someone would want to cut out a program geared at getting the youth of our Catholic faith to become more active.  The youth of today are continually being bombarded more and more by messages contrary to what we believe.  It is vital to have a program in place that caters to today’s youths, that provides them with opportunities to share and to grow in our faith.  Our brothers in the protestant faith seem to concentrate the majority of their time and energy on their kids to make sure that when the older generation moves into a new facet of their lives, that a new group would be ready to follow.  What our Archbishop is telling us is that our youth is just not a priority.  Aren’t there other places where cuts can be made?  If the program hasn’t been working, shouldn’t we be looking at ways to revitalize the program as opposed to getting rid of it and putting no focus on our kids?

I’m sure the argument here is that each parish should put together its resources and provide programs for their youth.  I truly do believe that this is necessary.  But if the Archdiocese doesn’t give this area any importance what will happen is that it will trickle down to the parishes and in the end we will wind up with no programs for the youth.  And if those running these parochial youth programs need a place to look to for guidance there will be none, leaving them isolated and discouraged if things are not working well.

The truth is i should have seen this coming.  Almost 15 years ago, when I was still running the Young Adult group at St. Brendan, we were fortunate enough (or so we thought) to have an audience with Archbishop Favalora.  At the time there was a large number of Young Adult groups in the archdiocese.  We wanted to find a way to help us to work together more effectively at the archdiocesan level.  There must have been over 40 YA leaders there for this meeting.  We were really excited.  After sharing our thoughts with the Archbishop and sharing our concerns and requesting access to certain resources, the archbishop stood up and pretty much told us that he wasn’t interested in what we were there to share.  He told us that we were pretty much on our own.  Well, one can see why the number of Young Adult groups in the Archdiocese has reduced to practically none.  Only a few remain, and they’re rarely heard from.  Now the same thing appears to be happening to the youth groups.  They now will not have a “head” to turn to and will no longer have two possible retreat houses to use, becuase they will no longer belong to the archdiocese.  These are sad days indeed!

Fortunately for us there are people who do care here in Miami.  Hopefully we can get together to help us get through these difficult times.  We also have a short period of time before our current Archbishop retires.  It seems that almost everyone I talk to regardless of age is counting down the days to this occurrance.  We need new blood in that position.  And we need someone who is ready to advocate for our youth.  Obviously, he didn’t follow the lead of our great Pope John Paul II who knew and realized the importance of the youth in our Church.  I’m sure he would be horrified by this decision.  If the Church is going to wind up losing money, might as well do it while trying to save our most imoportant resource… our future.

Today, I ask for prayers.  I ask for prayers for our youth.  I ask for prayers for our Archbishop, that he realize what he is doing to our youth.  I ask for prayers for all those willing to fight for our youth so that hopefully we can work to always teach them so that they can stay close to Mother Church.  I ask for everyone to just pray.  We all need prayers.  I do believe in obedience to our shephard.  I try to be so.  It’s just difficult when our shephard makes decisions without telling us why he is making them.  He always seems to send messages third hand, and without explanations.  It really stinks to be in the dark.  If I knew the reasons for these decisions, maybe it would be easier for me to swallow the reality, but the truth is, he doesn’t seem to care about what we feel or think regarding our place in this Church.  So it is up to us to speak out.  So here I am speaking out!!

Let’s make a difference.  Let’s let all those in the Archdiocese know the importance of our youth.  I am as active as I am today in the Church because of programs provided by our Church, because of retreats like the Encuentros, and because of the home away from home I had at the Youth Center.  Let us not cheat our kids from these same opportunities.  Let’s stand up today, loud and proud, and have our voices heard.  God bless our Church!!