A monthly publication of the Youth Department of the Diocese of Johannesburg

The elections are over. Promises were made. Now the time has come to keep them. It’s easier to make promises than to keep them, isn’t it. What about our baptism, confirmation or marriage promises. How well are we keeping them? Let’s not complain about politicians not keeping theirs if we’re not striving to be faithful to ours! Did you Vote? Remember! -U don’t have to B18 to vote for Jesus!

June is Youth Month! And need we remind everyone that June 16^th is National Youth Day!

On that day you are encouraged to do something positive in your neighbourhood or community as a parish youth group or else to participate in the various events that take place on this special day. If you are in the Vaal region you are invited to join in the Sport’s day which will take place at Sancta Maria school in Vanderbiljpark starting at 08h30. For more info, contact Mphikeleli @ (016) 592-4094 or Xola at 402-0757.

If you are in the East region, how about joining in a fun and sports day program at St Catherine in Germiston (31 Piercy Avenue) from 09h00 to 18h00.

Psalm 23 for Citizens

The POLITICIAN is my shepherd,

That's why I’m in such want.

He makes me to lie down on park benches;

He leads me beside noisy factories;

He disturbs my soul.

Yea, as I walk through the valley

of the shadow of depression and recession,

I can expect no recovery, for he is ruling me.

He prepares a reduction in my salary

in the absence of my union leaders.

He anoints my small income with great taxes.

My expenses run over the affordable line,

and unemployment and poverty follow me all the days of my life.

It seems that I shall live in a mortgaged house forever!

Risk!

to laugh is to risk appearing a fool;

to weep is to risk appearing sentimental;

to reach out for another is to risk involvement;

to expose your feelings is to risk exposing your true self;

to place your ideas, your dreams, before a crowd,

is to risk their loss;

to love is to risk not being loved in return;

to live is to risk dying;

to hope is to risk disappointment;

to try is to risk failure;...

YET … risks must be taken!...

because the greatest hazard in life is risking nothing!

The person who risks nothing,

does nothing,

has nothing,

is nothing.

Self realisation is even harder than self-sacrifice!

Looking for a Job?

We are often contacted for jobs at the youth office, but the Youth department is not an employment agency. However, we don’t mind occasionally providing some free advice. Has anyone noticed that there must be an opportunity to make money this week by taking down election campaign posters for the various parties who are responsible for removing them. Then it must be possible to get something for them as waste paper and cardboard, and if you are very enterprising, by selling them as collectibles to souvenir hunters. An idea worth pursuing to raise funds as a youth group, if not for individual employment!

Ngome Pilgrimage

The last 10 places out of 50 on the youth pilgrimage bus to Ngome are up for grabs. Cost: R300. Deposit to accompany booking – R100. For bookings, contact the youth office, by phone, fax or e.mail.

Diocesan News

Did you read the back page of this month’s Diocesan News at least. It consists of a full page profile of our Youth Department!

Kathorus Youth Day

On the 20^th June at Sacred Heart Parish, Katlehong, beginning with the parish mass at 09h00, followed by meeting, socialising and music.

Taize afternoon:

In the Vaal Region on the 08/08 from 13h00 to 17h00. Venue to be announced. For further info contact the Youth office @ 402-0757.

September 24^th is Diocesan Youth Day!

Please diarize it immediately. It will take place at Bosco on the public holiday for Heritage day, from 09h00 to 17h30. It will include a mass with Bishop Reginald Orsmond in the morning and a Youth Group Talent parade in the afternoon. Notices will be forwarded shortly to all parishes.

Welcome to Busi!

Busi Tshangase has moved into the youth ministry team for the coming year, replacing Norman Ross.

She was regional coordinator for Soweto for the past year.

DYF Meeting

Only 15 parish representatives turned up for the Diocesan Youth Forum meeting on the 29^th May from 11h00 – 16h00. At least 50 had been expected and so there was plenty of food to go round! It was nice to have Payneville and Kagiso represented for the first time. We missed the rest of you!

20^th June is Father’s Day – here is a special reflection for this feastday

If I speak in the slang of my teens and understand the language of their peers,

but do not give them love, I am just like so much noise falling on their ears.

If I could tell my children exactly what their future holds;

if I knew everything ahead of them, and

if I believe that someday each one of them will be successful,

but do not give them love, I am nothing.

If I give them everything they want;

if I sacrifice all I have - even my life - for them,

but do not love them, they gain nothing.

• A father's love is patient even with straying offspring.
• It is kind to the daughter who is hurting, even if it is her own fault. It never says: "I told you so!"
• Fatherly love is not rude, even to the rebellious son, nor easily angered by his ways.
• A father's love does not delight in dire predictions which come to pass,

but rejoices at the slightest sign of reform in the teen who drifts away.

• Fatherly love protects the toddler; firmly guides the adolescent;

hopes for those who falter year after year.

• A father's love never gives up.

Our plans for the future may fail. Our advice may be refused.

Our knowledge may fall short, for we do not know everything and we cannot control our children.

But we can always love. When I was a young father, I was a visionary.

I had all the formulas for successful child-rearing.

But when my children grew up, I had to put those immature ideas behind me.

Now I have no answers; I know so little and my understanding is limited.

Only in heaven will I know the rest. There my understanding will be complete.

My joy will be total and my tears will be wiped away. Three things I have now:

FAITH that my children will remember their training;

HOPE that this will influence their lives for the better, and

LOVE that continues no matter what. And the greatest of these three is LOVE!

(with acknowledgements to St Paul!)

The "How old are youth?" debate!

Some youth groups in the diocese have an average age of 23, others an average age of 17, and others are around the 14 year old average. This disparity makes it difficult run events at diocesan level or to encourage inter-parish activities. Even within the same parish the question causes some concern. At the quarterly meeting of the Council of Priests of Joburg Diocese last week, it was decided that the age groupings promulgated in the early 90ties, be implemented in a clear manner, as the flexible approach of the youth department to this issue was provoking unhealthy confusion. Thus in a manner which is unusual to this department, since we are not a controlling body, but a facilitating one, the following are the directives concerning the age groupings for young people in the parishes and movements in this diocese:

Anything up to 15 years of age is to be referred to as a Junior Youth group or children’s group. Youth refers to the 16-21 age group, and anyone 21 years of age and more is not to be considered a youth but a young adult, and is encouraged to move on into a grouping of that age, and to be involved with the "youth" on the basis of being a facilitator/animator and not as a member!

From the 1^st January 2000, these categories will be adhered to strictly across the diocese, and in the meantime, groups are challenged to start adapting themselves to fit into these three levels.

DTP?

Patrick Dacey, a long time collaborator of the youth department, is willing to provide Desk-Top-Publishing (DTP) tutoring (on Apple-Mac) at the Youth Office twice a week for 2 hour sessions from 10h00 to 12h00 to any young people interested. All you need is a desire to learn with a view to going into the printing/publishing trade, and to have the bare minimum of knowledge of how computers work. This is obviously a limited offer, since it will only cater for a handful of students at any stage. So if you’re interested do not delay in booking your slot.

Nominations for the DPC – Urgent response required

For the past 2 years, Anastacia Ndlovu and Isaac Malefane have been the two youth representatives on the Diocesan Pastoral Council. We are grateful to them for their dedication. Having now crossed the age limit for youth representatives, they are moving on and we need to delegate 2 new representatives. So we invite you to nominate (using the format here below), committed and practicing young Catholics between the age of 18 and 25, who will be able to attend the DPC meetings held at the Cathedral Hall on Saturday afternoons once every 4 months.

I, …………………………………………., hereby nominate / support the candidature of …………………………………………… as representative of the youth on the Diocesan Pastoral Council.

The following have already been nominated as candidates: Skhumbuzo Ntshalintshali (Cathedral); CJ Lievaux (Ennerdale); Norman Ross (Meadowlands); Ronny Morgan (Lenasia); Thabang Moeketsi (Sharpeville); Teboho Mashoeng (Orlando West); Mark Liesching (Reiger Park) and Dudu Malevu, Xola Nqono and Busi Tshangase who are part of the Youth Ministry team already.

If your nominee is not one of the above 10, please provide his / her particulars: Tel.no. and address.

Our Logo!

It represents a small group of people closely linked in love (the central heart shape) around the cross and overshadowed by a symbolic dove shape representing the Spirit. What else do you see in it?

T-Shirts

The Youth Department has a supply of white T-Shirts with our logo and the phrase –"Jesus is our CEO" – printed on the front. They can be purchased for R15 each, or R10 each for bulk orders of twenty or more. Your group could personalise this by having the name of your group/parish printed on the back. We presume everyone understands what CEO stands for!

A note about Amen

The word "amen" is a most remarkable word. It was transliterated directly from the Hebrew into the Greek of the New Testament, then into Latin and into English and many other languages, so that it has become a universal word. It has been called the best known word in human speech.

The word is directly related - in fact, almost identical - to the Hebrew word for "believe" (amam), or faithful. Thus, it came to mean "sure" or "truly", an expression of absolute trust and confidence.

1 amen {am-ane'} of Hebrew origin, a particle indeclinable meaning verily or

1) firm

1a) metaphorically = faithful

2) verily, also used at the beginning of a discourse with the sense of - surely, truly.

2a) and at the end with the sense - so it is, so be it, may it be fulfilled.

It was a custom, which passed over from the synagogues to the Christian assemblies, that when the one who had read or preached, had offered up solemn prayer to God, the others responded Amen, and thus made the substance of what had been spoken, their own.

Think about this the next time you utter AMEN among your prayers!

PenPals – Southern Cross

The Youth Centre" page which features fortnightly in the Southern Cross invites young people to send in any items of interest, especially their youth newsletters to the following address: The Youth Centre, Box 2372, Cape Town, 8000. Why not add them to your mailing list. If you would like a Catholic penpal, you can also send in your particulars and they will coordinate one for you.

Bosco Volunteers and Leadership Courses.

Each year a number of volunteers commit themselves to live and work as part of the Youth Ministry Team at Bosco, helping to run retreat programs and other courses. It’s a chance to give a year of your life to God. Application forms for the year 2000 are available from Fr Eoin Farrelly at Bosco or from the Youth Office.

The Bosco Youth Ministry team also run a number of leadership courses – for further info please contact 949-2360.

RU Y2K Compliant?

The following article from a newsletter illustrates that there’s nothing new under the sun!

Y1K - Canterbury, England. A.D. 999.An atmosphere close to panic prevails today throughout Europe as the millennial year 1000 approaches, bringing with it the so-called "Y1K Bug", a menace which, until recently, hardly anyone had ever heard of.

Prophets of doom are warning that the entire fabric of Western civilization, based as it now is upon monastic computations, could collapse, and that there is simply not enough time left to fix the problem. Just how did this disaster-in-the-making ever arise? Why did no one anticipate that a change from a three-digit to a four-digit year would throw into total disarray all liturgical chants and all metrical verse in which any date is mentioned? Every formulaic hymn, prayer, ceremony and incantation dealing with dated events will have to be re-written to accommodate three extra syllables.

All tabular chronologies with three-space year columns, maintained for generations by scribes using carefully hand-ruled lines on vellum sheets, will now have to be converted to four-space columns, at enormous cost. In the meantime, the validity of every official event, from baptisms to burials, from confirmations to coronations, may be called into question.

"We should have seen it coming ," says Brother Cedric of St. Michael's Abbey, here in Canterbury. "What worries me most is that 'THOUSAND' contains the word 'THOU,' which occurs in nearly all our prayers, and of course always refers to God. Using it now in the name of the year will seem almost blasphemous, and is bound to cause terrible confusion.

Of course, we could always use Latin, but that might be even worse – The Latin word for 'Thousand' is 'Mille' which is the same as the Latin for 'mile.' We won't know whether we're talking about time or distance!"

Stone-masons are already reported threatening to demand a proportional pay increase for having to carve an extra numeral in all dates on tombstones, cornerstones and monuments. Together with its inevitable ripple effects, this alone could plunge the hitherto-stable medieval economy into chaos.

A conference of clerics has been called at Winchester to discuss the entire issue, but doomsayers are convinced that the matter is now one of personal survival. Many families, in expectation of the worst, are stocking up on holy water and indulgences! Carpe diem!

Yizo Yizo!

In our last edition we invited comment on this series which ran on SABC earlier this year.

The following (edited excerpt) was sent in by Thabang Justice Moeketsi, from Our Lady of Fatima Parish, Sharpeville.

"Some sensitive viewers failed to understand why such a drama could be shown. It certainly contained scenes that reflect what is still happening in our township schools, which are not worse than in the past. Although it would be recommended for parents to give some guidance to their children on the series, I felt that it at least gave encouragement to people to do something against the criminal bullies in our communities. At least towards the end of the series we saw the baddies being dealt with courageously by their peers, and Papa Action who thought he was such a hero was proved not to be one."

Recommended Youth Religious program to watch – "Wordz-Out" on Sunday evenings at 17h00 on SATV1.

Arrive Alive in Heaven!

How often do you complain, especially to your parents, that they are too strict,… that you’re tired of their advice, that you want to decide for yourself and learn by yourself. I so often hear young people say they’ve got to be left to learn by their own mistakes… The trouble is that these days, mistakes are not just little ones that you can learn from. I know too many young people who have made mistakes which they cannot even recover from, never mind learn from! Mistakes which they will carry for the rest of their lives, with so much pain and regret. Rather than make mistakes of your own, learn from God and your elders how to avoid mistakes. Be smart, don’t live dangerously; rather live wisely and holy and if you worry you will miss out, be consoled that you avoid lots of heartbreaking crashes.

T-Shirt competition:

The answer to last issue’s T-Shirt prize challenge was that apart from the face of an old man, in the picture, in place of his face, you can distinguish a loving couple hugging each other. Only one person phoned in the correct answer, and she was considered over-age to win the T-Shirt.

Here follows the challenge for this issue’s T-Shirt prize. To win, phone in the list of neighbours in correct order from left to right.

Fran, Helen, Ida, Jane and Grace and their husbands all live on a certain street that runs east to west. From the following clues, give each couple’s full names and describe exactly where on the street each couple lives. Here are their five houses.

 The clues:

1. Grace has Ralph as one next door neighbour and the Greens as her other next door neighbour.
2. The browns live in the westernmost house – Ned in the eastermost.
3. Sam has Ida as one next door neighbour and Peter as his next door neighbour on the other side.
4. Both Jane and Peter live east of the Whites.
5. Peter lives next door to the Blacks.
6. Tom lives west of the Greys and east of Grace.
7. Helen and Jane are next door naighbours. The Greys live next to Jane also, but on the other side.

Games

Pass it on:

Everyone stands in a circle and each participants is given an object (or takes one out of their pocket or bag. Objects can be large or small – shoe, pen, watch, dustbin, ball,… At the word "go", everyone starts passing his/her object to the one on the right, and objects must keep moving continuously as rapidly as possible. When anyone drops an object, that person must leave the game but the object continues to be passed on. As the game progresses and more people drop out, it becomes more and more difficult but also more hilarious as there are more objects than hands, until the last two or three find it impossible to handle all the objects.

Clothes pegs Relay

Tie a string shoulder-height across the room. Place as many clothe pegs on it as there are members in the group. Divide the group in two teams. The aim of the game is to dash to the string, remove a clothes-peg using no hands, only teeth, and return in relay race fashion. The second round, the race is to replace all the pegs back on the line.

Run the gauntlet

The girls are given old newspapers to roll up into bats. Boys are given a balloon each, to blow and tie up with some string to the back loops of their shorts/trousers/belts. The boys must then run (with arms folded) between two lines of girls of girls who try to pop the balloons by hitting them with their newspaper batons.

A fundraising idea! A biblical marathon.

The Guinness Book of Records has the world record for reading the entire Bible non-stop set at 96 hours. How about trying to break that record with a group reading of the bible, swapping readers every 10 minutes while others listen. Perhaps you won’t manage to set a new record or even get through more than a third of the bible, but even if you just set yourselves a 12 hour session, and have parishioners sponsor you per page read in that time, it may still be worth-while! Not just on financial results but on the resulting bible knowledge!