I adored my first Youth Conference. The effect that it had on the participants was described as a “Golden Bomb” in their year, and after experiencing one, I couldn’t agree more. The memories of that weekend will live with me forever. I still feel the confidence in our group as we sang, care free, parading down the street. I still see the sun and the smiles as we reflected on a labyrinth and conversed under an old oak tree. There was a power in reading I Have a Dream by Martin Luther King as the sun rose in the same spot where he read it. We made true connections with complete strangers during profound conversations with other teenagers. The sheer verve created by the youth conference instilled me with hope.  All these joyous moments helped me grow and heal. Finally, I can testify that these youth conferences  really do create a “Golden Bomb” in one’s year.

Leap, Laugh, Love.

By Rachel Soliday, 17, Wauwatosa, Wisconsin

Video of 2014 DC Youth Conference

To see the stars it needs to be dark. In the long dark winter nights we have many opportunities to lift our gaze and stand in wonder at the abundance of sparkling stars. Fixed stars we call them. They are always there and can be found reliably in that higher order, and they never stop shining. The experience is: stars stand above us. Even if they rise and set, we “look up” to them.

In contrast, the sun always rises up from below. Strong and powerful its rising light lets the stars recede as if they were no longer there. We don’t usually look up to the sun: we look into the world, work in the world, live our destiny in the bright sunlight. Ideals shine above our head like stars. There are moments, when we see them clearly, when they motivate and inspire the course we take in life. Then there can be long periods when we seem to lose sight of them, even doubt they are real. When in the soul, the darkness of confusion, loss of orientation and motivation spreads itself, it requires a decision to turn the inner gaze upward and trust that the star of one’s ideal is still shining. Read more

Many of the inner pictures connected with the birth of Christ, with the Nativity that we carry in our imaginations, place the light filled holy family into a protective sheath of surrounding darkness. We can think of Rembrandt’s Nativity, or of Ninetta Sombart’s Birth of Christ and sense the sheltering quality that the darkness lends to the holy event of his birth. The Christ Child is received into the blanket of night and, in equal measure the darkness of night has a role to play in the events surrounding Christ’s birth.

We can thus begin to distinguish between different qualities of darkness. Read more