Massive in Montreal

Massive Worship had an amazing time in Montreal!

We drove up from Ottawa, stayed for the weekend, and had a Youth Rally.

During the rally there were about 5 priests available for confession, and we had no idea how receptive the youth would be to this because youth rallies are quite new to this area. The whole time the priests were available, though, there was a steady stream of participants going to confession!

Before the rally started, I had sat down and was talking to some of the youth and I met a group of about five 14-16 year olds. They were musicians so it was really cool to hear their excitement about the rally (I also told them they could be the future Massive Worship team). They were wondering what was all going to be involved in the night and I told them that there would be confessions going on during the rally. They had a “no-reaction” reaction, you know? Like "oh, that’s cool…." It was kind of what I was expecting from a group of teens, because I used to be the same way about confession, but I really wanted them to see that it was a great chance to receive the mercy of Jesus.

After the rally was over I got the chance to talk to them again and one of the boys came up to me and said that he was really glad that there was confession and that if there hadn't been the worship music and the rally it he wouldn’t have gone to confession. He said that the worship music made it much easier for him to get into it. It made us so happy to know that what we are doing, our ministry, and our worship is leading people to sacraments and the grace that maybe they wouldn’t have experienced in any other situation.

There was also a group of girls that came up to us who really enjoyed the rally. They were inspired by the music and how it creates such a great environment for retreats and for the youth. They were planning on starting up their own worship band to play at Mass and to also play music for confirmation retreats in their parish.

It’s these kinds of things that give me a lot of hope.

We are very excited this week to start our trek out West!!

Keep your eyes out for events in your area!

God Bless!

Brandi Olson

We Are Blessed

Greetings from iNFUSE Team 3 Wetaskiwin! Cecile here- it’s a pleasure to be writing for you this week!

Well, life here in Alberta is swell. We are so blessed to be living in Wetaskiwin and serving God in such a tangible way this year. Maybe that’s the theme of this week’s blog – we are blessed. Well, let me tell you about some of the events we ran this week:

We had a junior high girls' sleepover this past Friday night, and let me tell you, it was incredible. We had 15 girls hand in registration forms throughout the week, so we never guessed that almost 10 extra girls would show up the night of, with registration forms, sleeping bags, and open hearts! We wanted to keep the night very fun and girly, and it was! Nail painting, face masks, and a fashion show were just some of the fun, spa-like activities we offered, but the most incredible thing was the prayer time we had in the church around 10 PM that evening. We had a living rosary, where we made a rosary of candles and as we said each prayer someone would light a candle. Afterwards, we had a time of quiet personal prayer and reflection, and we offered prayer ministry. It blew me away how the young women totally invested in this time of prayer. A few of the girls were in tears – the Holy Spirit was moving! Throughout the free time over the evening, girls would wander back into the church and just sit in Christ’s presence!
The ladies of our team, and our female volunteers helping that night went into the church at 3am and lit all the candles from the rosary again, and sang the Chaplet of Divine Mercy. It was an incredible night to say the least!


On Sunday we had a social high school event – we went bowling! We had a great turnout mostly drawing from the grade 9 demographic as the teens in grades 10-12 all had finals this week, so needed to study. But, it was still a fantastic bonding opportunity with our younger teens! Now, I’ll be honest, I’m a terrible bowler, but that afternoon I came in second on my team!! After bowling for an hour we headed back to the church and played Mafia (our favourite game!), and just chilled with the teens who came out. We had a great afternoon!

Tuesday we had our team day, and we went to a local trail aptly named “Chickadee Trail”. We would stop walking and put a bit of birdseed on our open palms, and the chickadees would land right on our hands and peck at the seed! It was incredible! Because of the snowstorms we have had in the past few weeks, the trail was covered in about three feet of snow, so we had a few slipping episodes (mostly accomplished by yours truly). Anyway, afterwards we headed into the nearby town of Camrose and chilled at a local coffee shop and attempted to dry our soaking jeans (due to the snow on the trail). The amazing thing is the weather here! This week the temperatures have hovered around 0 degrees Celsius, today its up to 6 degrees Celsius! Its so weird, it feels like the beginning of spring!
This coming weekend we are bringing some of our youth to a Face to Face Retreat that will be held at the OLVC (Our Lady of Victory Camp). Pray that their hearts will be open to whatever God has in store for them!

God has truly blessed our team this past week with the incredible weather, the amazing girls' retreat, and some beautiful affirmations from our Parish!

Well, I pray you all have a wonderful week! You, our readers and supporters, are in our prayers!

Blessings!
Cecile Richard
iNFUSE Team 3
Wetaskiwin, AB

Massive Worship: The Root of it All

Ever wonder how a successful business got its start or what inspired a profound movement across the country or even what compels someone to do something totally radical and against the grain? I don’t know about you, but I love investigating and looking back to where it all started and seeing the original grassroots of magnificent things. They usually start pretty simple and unsophisticated, but it’s these simple beginnings that “wow” us later on.

Take for instance the Apple III from the 1980’s. Well, okay, it seems pretty archaic now, and most of these computers were recalled because they continued to detrimentally overheat- but hey, look at where it got us: these days Apple computers are pretty much the best computers ever and the most coveted of gadgets. Everyone wants a Mac!

But perhaps some more exciting roots to look at are those of the Saints. I always wonder, “How in the world did they become so darn holy?” Was it their blessed parents and a good upbringing, or their amazing parish community? Or are there just certain people that God zaps with incredible holiness? Just recently I’ve started reading about a more modern saint, Saint Gianna Beretta Molla. What initially attracted me to her was how normal and ordinary, yet heroic her life was. She was a wife, mother, and doctor, which sounds like any number of peoples I know, yet in Gianna there is something special about how she lived her life which I find so amazing and even attainable for me, and that’s inspiring.

Now perhaps Massive Worship’s roots don’t go quite as deep as Apple or even Saint Gianna, but these roots play such a vital role in what and who we as Massive Worship are today. One of the aspirations of Massive Worship from the start in 2005, was to bring together a community of Catholic musicians from all across Canada, creating a unique space for fellowship, training, and spiritual growth specific to musicians. Over the past few years, this vision and goal has expanded to include so much more, especially since our last Massive Worship National Conference in 2008. It’s been three years since then and God has fulfilled some pretty amazing plans for our ministry, including a hugely successful traveling music team. But after three-year hibernation, we are happy to announce that this spring God is bringing us back to our roots!

Great plans have been underway for this year’s Massive Worship National Conference, taking place this spring in NET’s hometown, Ottawa, ON. We’ve got some great speakers and musicians lined up, such as nationally renowned Franciscan University’s youth ministry expert Bob Rice, and talented Canadian singer/songwriter Joe Zambon. The Massive Worship conference is not just for musicians but also includes a great youth ministry and leadership component. Participants will hear and learn from some of Canada’s best when it comes to sustainable youth ministry, effective music ministry, young adult formation, liturgy, songwriting, sound mixing, contemporary instrument training and so much more. Massive Worship conferences have always been a great place to encounter growth for effective music ministry, be equipped and empowered for development in youth ministry and leadership, and experience amazing fellowship with other Catholic musicians and youth leaders from across the country. So join with us once again, March 25-27th, 2011 as we go back to the root of it all. Registrations will open soon so keep watch on our website www.massiveworship.com Stay rooted, and I’ll see you in Ottawa!

Mairin Bierer,

Massive Worship Coordinator

Info/Details:

Massive Worship National Conference

Until the Whole World Hears

March 25-27^th, 2011

Ottawa, ON

www.massiveworship.com

Back with Fire

Greetings fellow inhabitants of the world wide web!

So we are back in Yellowknife after a well needed Christmas break, and we are back into the swing of things with a fiery

passion.

Since being back, it seems as though God has been really present within our team. I believe He has revealed the beauty and importance of our team, and how much of a family we really are to each other. We have been thoroughly enjoying each other’s presence both in the office and in our time together as a team. This love for each other and for God is growing so great that we are finding that true desire to share it with those around us. We have a passion for this ministry like none we’ve had before.

Our first Ignite since being back was called the “Ultimate Challenge”, a social night where we had free pizza and set up a series of activities and competitions, and gave out candy for prizes... who wouldn’t want to come? It was tons of fun and actually had lots of new people, thanks to the promotions in the schools that Ben and Mylène created. It was a great success, and the new people said they were coming back.

This week for Ignite, we’re having a night on self-image, and the team's creative juices are really pumping, because we’ve come up with an entire night full of new material for the theme of self-image. Mylène, Ben and Kandace wrote a new drama, while Adele and Tyler worked together to write a two-person talk, and Adam and I focused on some great ideas for the environment. We are praying that the night will go well, and that God will touch the hearts of the youth.

Another exciting event in the life of Yellowknife Infuse is that it was recently Adam’s birthday. We had an awesome night out at Trappers Lake that consisting of an excellent supper, present opening (Adam’s family sent him a parcel full of fun), and a bannock cake covered in northern light candles. We had great fun, and even ventured out onto the lake and saw some real northern lights. A perfect way to finish the night.

We have lots of exciting events coming up, and we would appreciate your prayers for all of them. We have a high school overnight retreat coming up on January 28th and 29th called “Encounter”, we are still hoping for more registrations, and we are praying for a good turn out and for God to really move throughout the retreat. We also have a rally for around 230 grades 5 & 6 students on February 1st, which we are really excited for. As well the week later we have another overnight retreat with students from a community called Behcoko outside of Yellowknife. We are enthused by all of these events, and hope that you will keep us in your prayers as you will be in ours.

We hope that you are all doing well, and that God is blessing you this New Year, and cannot wait to tell you more of God’s amazing work here in Yellowknife.

Until then,

April Fogle

Yellowknife iNFUSE Team 1

P.S. We are currently experiencing the lowest temperature yet here with a bone chilling -41 degrees celsius! Brrrr!!!

Dinner Is Served!

Hello from Wetaskiwin!!!!

Things here are busy as usual! Friday called for our EDGE night.The theme was on the Epiphany. Our youth minister, Peter, gave an amazing talk and the youth were so engaged by him. We are so blessed to work with him this year!

Sunday was amazing! First, our team came for the coffee social after the morning mass to visit with the parishioners. I can't even begin to talk about how amazing everybody is here! Cecile and I had a very good chat with a family of Sacred Heart Parish. We sat down and talked for a long time about each other. We talked about events coming up and how the two youth (one male and one female) should join our CREW (to help out at EDGE nights). They were so amazing, and I am glad that I finally had the chance to get to know them. It really taught Cecile and me to be bold and to continue to invest in the families of the parish. Sunday night was our Lifeteen Mass. Fr. Marc came to talk about Lectio Devina, but the night really took an unscheduled turn... for the best! It was extremely Holy Spirit inspired! One of the youth (who was new to Lifeteen this year) started to ask questions, and the discussion just started flowing! Praise God!

Yesterday was our team day! It was filled with lots of fun stuff. Cecile and Marcus told us to dress up, but we were really unsure why. Our first stop was IKEA! Oh my goodness, we had so much fun! We explored the show room, and pretty much just played a big game of house! When we came accross the office part of the show room, we all pretended to be NET staff at the office. It made us laugh. Our next stop was the West Edmonton Mall, where we did various things. You seriously can spend FOREVER in that mall. Next, we went to the Basilica for Mass, and reunited (unexpectedly) with NET alumnus Lydia Cristini. The next thing was a big surprise FOR ME! We got into the van, and everyone pulled out a piece of paper with the "Be Satisfied With Me" prayer. This is my MOST favourite prayer ever! So we found out that everyone had to dress up for my birthday! We went out to an Irish Pub and listened to Celtic music! It was so great. All in all, it was a great day! Thanks team for making my birthday so amazing!

God is really helping us to see how truly blessed we are this year. Yes, we are extremely busy, but God is telling us to take a step back and reflect on how He is working in the hearts of everyone in Wetaskiwin. I am so glad that God has called each one of us here this year.

Please keep our team in your prayers in the upcoming weeks. We have a lot of events coming up that we are very excited for. We have a Face to Face retreat for high school students on Jan 29/30. We are helping out with confirmation classes, starting up our chastity groups for young men and women (Glass Alabaster & Real Men), Theology on Tap for young adults, along with EDGE and Lifteen. We are so excited for all these things! We hope to start our leadership training series soon, so please pray for that as well.

Thanks for being such amazing readers! We always keep the supporters of NET in our prayers. Well, I am off to eat Shepherds Pie and Birthday Cake! Yummmm. My favourite birthday meal ever!

God Bless,

Katie Doyle

iNFUSE Team 3

Wetaskiwin, AB