I Love Music...

... not necessarily, whatever’s on the radio, or the latest band who comes to the nearest big city to perform, but I mean writing! Experimenting! Using whatever’s in the kitchen cupboard to make a drum beat; recording so many harmonies that one voice turns into a whole choir!
I love writing words, making them sound interesting, catchy, making people want to sing those words!

But what REALLY takes the cake is playing every Sunday night at our youth mass in Wetaskiwin, assisting the mass with songs of praise to our King!

Every week I get to take the words of the psalm and put music behind it! It can be challenging writing a different tune every week, But God has given me graces to come up with something new each weekend!

Included in this part of the music ministry is – the forming of a band! Bands are GREAT! I’ve been in three, but now I get to train up 8 young talented muso’s from Wetaskiwin to play at mass. The most recent to our line up is a guy called Kyle. Kyle’s in Grade nine, and like our other drummer Zach, he’s got skill, he’s tight (he knows what he’s playing, when he has to play it and he plays it!). He has a great feel for the worship songs that we play! Zach played his first mass on Sunday, and even posed for us in a photo (to the right). In the other photo we have Christie! Christie is great! She’s the next Stevie Wonder...she’s not going blind or anything, she just has a great passion for music, she does her homework and improves every week!

In 2 months I get to plan a musicians retreat for these 8 little rascals. Dude! Is anybody else as excited as me? IF SO, here’s what you can do, you can pray for us here in Wetaskiwin, the whole music ministry that it evolves, invites and overflows with God’s graces.
Thanks for your prayers fellow reader...

God Bless ya

Emma
Team 4

What?! 90 Teens, Fruit, and Adoration!

Hello, it's Shayla from Team Five-Alive. We've had another great week of ministry. We had a successful Edge night that still attracted a large number of young teens. We also attended the Confirmation of the teens that we did the Confirmation retreat for. And finally, we had an open Lifenight on the Eucharist.

Edge was full of so much energy once again, but this time it was more controlled. Our location was changed to St. John's High School in Perth from the Elementary school. That made a huge difference for us because we were able to set up a microphone. Those things work wonders when you have 90 energetic young people. This night was on a call to holiness and Sainthood. Basically the teens learned about the saints, and how they too can all be saints. I had two highlights from that night that put a huge smile on my face. The first was when the young teens started to cheer for Jesus in a slideshow that we had. We had made a slideshow of a whole bunch of Saints and just really holy people. We showed it to them at the beginning of the night, and again at the end, but at the end we took pictures of them and added it to the slideshow. As they were intently watching the screen, Jesus's picture came up, and the teens broke out into a huge cheer! That touched my heart so much. The second highlight was when I was teaching them the songs 'Just Like You' and 'Shine Like the Son'. The teens got so into it. I've never experienced such enthusiasm for singing like they did. I remember at the end of 'Shine Like the Son', I encouraged them to sing their hearts out...and they did. They sang at the top of their lungs. What added to this was when i was done teaching, some of the teens came up to me and were asking if we could do just one more song. As music leader, those moments are so uplifting.

Sunday was another special day for us. We went to a Confirmation in Lanark. The Bishop was there and all the teens that we did a Confirmation Encounter Day for. They were so excited to see us there. It was cute because I saw a huddle of them talking and they were looking at us saying, "Look! There's the NET team!". The beauty of a Parish team is that you get to see the fruits of your ministry.

This Sunday we had an intense Lifenight. It was on the Eucharist. For this Lifenight we decided to have it open to the community. We had a pretty decent response from the adults. They came out and participated with the night. I think they really enjoyed it, and were happy that they were able to see what was being done with the youth. It was also an opportunity for the community to see the importance and beauty of the Eucharist. The best part was Adoration. There was such an air or reverence among the teens and adults during Adoratoin, and they all participated with singing...it was just beautiful. That's the only word that can really describe it. I hope that the community will be really involved once we start up XLT (monthly Adoration) because I think they loved it.

Well, that concludes Team 5's week. We're praying for all you other teams out there.

God Bless,

Shayla

De l'océan, jusqu'à la capitale des érablières, c'est tout un voyage!

Re-bonjour à tous! Encore une fois, c'est Kevin Prada, votre bloggeur amical de l'équipe 3, présentement dans la région de la capitale du sirop d'érable, la Beauce. Ici, le temps s'annonce très enneigé, mais parmi les routes couvertes de blanc, et le sol en patinoire, notre ministère va très bien.

On a continué notre route après une retraite de fin de semaine, qui a connu beaucoup de succès avec les jeunes du diocèse de Bathurst, la fin de semaine dernière. Près d'une soixantaine de jeunes y étaient, et comme je le dis toujours, comme c'est toujours vrai, le Seigneur était si présent. Il y en avait de tous les âges, de dix à dix-huit ans. Pour moi, étant donné que c'est ma deuxième année sur la route, et qu'on a animé cette même retraite pour ce même groupe l'an passé, c'était vraiment "l'fun" de pouvoir rétablir tous les liens avec les gens de là-bas. On s'est rencontré en équipe après la fin de semaine, et tous ont vu une différence chez les jeunes, du début de la session jusqu'à la fin. C'est incroyable de voir combien de jeunes sont à la recherche de la vérité, des jeunes qui ne savent pas où la trouver! Et c'est ça notre mission cette année, c'est de montrer aux jeunes de notre pays qui est leur Père, qui est leur Dieu, et qui les aime par-dessus tout. C'est ça la vérité qu'on tâche de répandre dans le pays, et spécialement comme équipe bilingue, dans la communauté francophone canadienne. Et ce qu'il y a de plus beau dans notre mission, c'est de voir des jeunes, comme on en a vus à Bathurst, qui changent visiblement la direction que prenait leur vie et qui, par la grâce de Dieu, reconnaissent l'essentiel, qu'ils sont fils ou fille de Dieu.

J'ai lu une citation dernièrement: 'Il ne faut pas seulement croire que Dieu existe, mais aussi que tu existes pour Dieu'. Et ce sont les deux messages de base que nous abordons lors des journées de rencontre: que Dieu existe, et ensuite, que nous existons pour Lui. Et lorsqu'on découvre ces deux faits, notre vie change complètement.

On est arrivé ici, en Beauce, lundi passé, avec des conditions météorologiques pas très favorables. De la pluie verglaçante, de la neige, de la glace. Mais par la prière, la grâce de Dieu, et des "méchants" bons conducteurs, on est arrivé ici sains et saufs, prêts à entamer encore un nouveau séjour au sein de notre ministère. Depuis notre arrivée, on a pu passer la journée de mardi ensemble, en équipe, en visitant le Vieux-Québec. Wow! C'est vraiment incroyable de voir ça, spécialement puisque je suis amateur d'histoire (c'est un côté de ma personalité un peu "nerd"...je l'avoue...haha). Et en plus, penser que c'est là, le berceau de l'Église en Amérique du Nord...c'est vraiment intense! Et, avec la belle petite neige qui tombait, c'était encore plus beau.

On prie beaucoup pour tous les jeunes qu'on rencontre, spécialement pour ceux qu'on va rencontrer ce soir en retraite au village de Saint-Prosper. On prie, sachant que le Seigneur va nous répondre, et sachant qu'encore plusieurs miracles sont planifiés pour nous tout au long de notre route.


Passez une bonne semaine! Union de prières!

Kevin Prada

P.S. En haut, c'est une photo de groupe de l'équipe, à la suite de la retraite cette fin de semaine à Bathurst; puis en bas, c'est (de gauche à droite) Christiana, Katelyn, puis Déneige, dans l'amphithéâtre de l'école dans laquelle on a animé la retraite.

Team 2 celebrates life and sees the Falls!

Greetings Everyone! It's Claire from Team 2; I haven't written a blog in a while so I'm excited about this one! So what has Team 2 been up to this past week? Well, let me tell you!

Last Sunday we went to Trevor's home in Woodstock before heading to our next stop in Burlington. It was great to meet his family, especially his two nieces, who are adorable!

The first half of the week we did three Confirmation retreats, which went well. On Monday, the retreatants seemed a little backward at first, but they really warmed up during the day. I was amazed at how much my small group knew about the sacrament. We had a great discussion on the saints that they picked; I learned a lot!

Tuesday was Katie's 19th birthday! Yay! On Thursday we had a team day and celebrated her birthday. In the morning, all the girls had a pajama party and watched High School Musical 3 (one of Katie's favorites). In the afternoon we had team sharing and then went to Boston Pizza. We hope Katie had a good first birthday away from home!

We had a busy day on Friday. The team split into two and went to four different schools. We did hour long sessions for grades 7 and 8. We did an opening session, the Confirmation talk, and then invited the students to the retreat that night. We didn't know how much of a response we would get, but that night several youth came from the schools! They were really excited to be there; it made me so happy! The retreat was awesome; the theme of the night was Camouflaged. Katie did the talk for only the second time and did a great job! The youth were very moved during prayer ministry. We really felt the Holy Spirit working that night. Praise Him!

On Saturday we had our second family retreat, which was a success. We had around 15 families attend, and they all seemed to have a good day. I really enjoyed getting to know the families; it's so beautiful to see them having fun and praying together!

For our team day on Monday, we went to Niagra Falls! We were all very excited, especially those who had never seen the Falls. It was a rainy day and a little misty, but we still got a good view and, as you can see, took some great pictures! We also took the "Behind the Falls" tour and walked around the gift shops. It was a great day hanging out as a team and experiencing God's awesome creation!

Well, that wraps up Team 2 new this week. We are ready to attack another week of ministry and whatever God else wants to send our way! Till next week!
God Bless!

Peacing out,

Claire

Team 2

How much for 12 Barrels?

Hey Yah Everybody!!!

So we finished our week in the St. Catherines Diocese! It was a really awesome week to say the least; we spent a couple days in Niagara Falls, which was lots of fun and it was my first time going there! Well, it was a first for most of us!

We spent a Team day at the Falls, it involved a lot of walking and wandering. We walked downtown and then made our way to the Falls; on the way we met a guy and a girl, Sarah and Jeremiah, who had both been involved with Hillsong, leading worship. They were making their way to the Falls as well, and we kept bumping into them along the way. So they decided to join us, in our random adventure to the Falls. On the way back to the downtown area we split off into groups to wander on our own and sight see. Some of us went to a Haunted House - it wasn 't scary at all............okay, I'm lying to myself, I was screaming like a little girl, hiding in the middle of everybody. It was a fun experience, and for only five bucks! At the end of the day when we went back to our vans, Sarah and Jeremiah asked if they could say a prayer for us before we left - they were very supportive of what we did and were very pleased to have met us. It was a pretty sweet day.

We had about four retreats in the diocese, it was lots of fun, each retreat just kept getting better! We then finished off our week by surprising Donny with his "unbirthday". He was very shocked, we had a couple rounds of grounders on the play structures, then had a delicious supper with the parish priest and then had adoration, followed by an intense night of volleyball. We then said good-bye to the St. Catherines diocese, and started on our long journey to Winnipeg. Saturday was spent traveling all day, we stopped by Dominique's house and got to meet her family. Although it was a short visit, it was memorable, but like all travel days we had to keep moving. So we made our way to Sault Ste. Marie. The next day we made our way to Thunder Bay, where I am currently writing this blog right now!

When you tune in next week we will be in Winnipeg, or as some people call it "Winterpeg, Manitsnowba". I hope we don't freeze to death! Anywho...............

God Speed

Sean Milan Net Team 1