Archdiocesan primary schools journeying with Jesus

Youth Minister Sarah Larkin.

This year we have been able to launch the primary school model of Catholic Schools Youth Ministry Australia (CSYMA) at St Matthew’s and St. Vincent’s Primary schools. The model involves running the Journeying with Jesus retreat days.

Recently, we ran the St. Matthew’s retreat day. The Journeying with Jesus retreat was a faith-filled experience for the senior students of St Matthew’s Primary school.

The day was packed with games, activities, dramas, videos and talks that all looked into the Gospel messages of God’s love, salvation, and forgiveness.

We had an incredible team of youth ministers from the Canberra and Goulburn archdiocese to lead the day. We were also grateful to have a special visit from recently ordained Deacon Alex Osborne from St Matthew’s and St Vincent’s Parish.

It was great to have him take the time out of his busy schedule to spend time with the students.

St. Matthew’s and St. Vincent’s youth minister Sarah Larkin was blown away by the experience, both on a personal level and on behalf of the students.

“Being the youth minister to help start CSYMA Junior at St Matthew’s and St Vincent’s has been an incredible experience,” she said.

“I have loved getting to know all of the students and being able to watch them grow and learn more about themselves and their faith in such a short amount of time. The students are so eager to be involved in all that Youth Ministry has to offer.

“After the initial ‘Journey with Jesus’ retreat day with the year 5 and 6 classes at both schools we were able to start up our very own Youth Ministry Team and with this new group of students, together we worked on developing relationships with God as well as helping increase the spirituality of peers through leading sacramental retreat days and teaching others about the deeper meaning of social justice fundraisers. 

“We held our first Youth Mass in the parish which was a great time to celebrate Mass and welcome new families into the parish, this then helped launch the new Junior Youth Group for year 3-6 students which is sure to continue growing into the future.

“It has been an exciting time starting up primary school ministry and it will be great to continue living out the life and mission of the church with these young students.”

We can’t wait to see the primary school youth ministry deepen and expand into the future.