Church and society urged to engage with youth

THE chairman of a Northside parish youth group said the greatest challenge facing the church today, and indeed so ciety as a whole, is to reach out to connect, engage and involve our youth.

Paul Fagan of Howth Parish Youth Group was speaking at the graduation ceremony for Transition Year students at Stella Maris Retreat Centre, Howth.

“To do this successfully we have to learn to play on their pitch through mediums and themes which interest them in order to engage them proactively,

? said Mr Fagan.

It was with this challenge in mind that the Howth Parish Youth Group initiated the TYS programme seven years ago. Today, it has evolved into an established programme embracing both Howth and Sutton Parishes.

The programme is centred around two principle concepts – personal growth and responsibility, and community project involvement.

Half day, once a month, group sessions focus on well tailored engagements around physical, dietary, spiritual and mental health issues, together with a devoted session to career guidance.

A particular challenge for students is a competition between themselves to design a

‘self sustained’ community that would be multicultural in dimension, with a cross section of every socio-economic group in society.

The challenge is to design a community that is built to meet its own identified and agreed values and needs.

This year’s results and presentations, which were co-assessed and co-judged by Senator Averil Power, Fianna Fail’s spokesperson on education, gave the mentors an insight into the students’ views of the future.

In the opening session, the students were challenged to come forward with ideas to improve the appearance and services in and around the Howth/Sutton Peninsula. They presented their findings to Independent Councillor Cian O’Callaghan and Tim Fitzgibbon, Operations Manager at Dublin Bus.

Their voices were heard with a clean up to the Welcome to Howth approach at the entrance to Deerpark, and the clean up of the bank in Balkill Park, Howth.

Significantly, as a direct result of their own ideas, a

‘real time’ display for the bus stop outside Howth DART Station has been approved by the National Transport Authority.

An interface with the local community gardai and the Howth Coast Guard Service was also a part of the programme.

This year 35 students drawn from five secondary schools participated in the programme with the full support of their school TYS coordinators.

The monthly group sessions took place in the Scoil Mhuire School Hall, Howth, with the kind permission of Principal, John Chambers.