The end of another year

At the end of each year I feel the need to write a message of reflection as there are many people who have crossed my path and been a part of ministry in St. Augustine’s Melbourne. It has been a while since my last post (I usually write a half year update and missed that) so there’s quite a few changes to share.

St. Augustine’s Young Adults (STAY)
As of half way through the year, I had transferred my leadership of STAY to Pat who had been an amazing leader of STAY cell group through the previous year. It was a move which was necessary more out of capacity rather desire/want to continue as leader. Aaron has continued to support Pat just as he has supported me in leading STAY so she won’t be alone in what is a daunting role/responsibility. I still feel like a leader in STAY despite not being in the position – I think it’s something that might be hard to move from as STAY is so much a part of me as I am a part of STAY.

In blunt honesty, the 2nd half of 2015 has been a struggle for STAY. The continuous level of growth and success of the ministry climaxing with “Redeemed” - a worship/dance/drama production of Stations of the Cross back in Easter left the group wanting and expecting more of God’s grace and power. Instead however, I felt participation slowly wane thereafter. STAY cell group did not grow in numbers as anticipated from the slow but steady flow of new people to the group. Consistency of attendance became more sporadic which made it difficult to build intimacy towards the STAY vision of creating a ‘Sanctuary’ for its members. I think the busyness of life for members and even leaders were taking a toll on STAY – this is also reflected in the numbers of recent posts on our blog...

Friends of Refugees (FORM)
I felt the fall in STAY participation most in the refugee outreach (FORM) which I have continued to lead. In the previous 2 years, STAY members were the backbone of volunteers in FORM visits to refugee families and more demandingly in Moving Days. STAY has however slowly become less of the backbone, with more than half the volunteers coming from outside STAY, from the parish, friends of friends and even Facebook. For such a large group of ~40 people in STAY, the small amount of support FORM received from them, made it feel like it wouldn’t be missed by STAY if it simply shut down and disappeared.

My words are however a discredit to the members from STAY who are actually regular volunteers and who I might have taken for granted at the start, expecting them to be there on a month by month basis or when it suited them. As much as I long for STAY members to be part of / help in outreach for refugees, God has amazingly provided us with sufficient volunteers to support the ministry even though at times it looked like we wouldn’t have enough.
We didn’t do anything new or vastly different, but this year we completed 8 sets of detention centre visits, home visits and Moving Days, the latter of which has grown bigger and better. We also ended the year with a Christmas hamper run to over 130 families, about double the number from the previous year.

This has encouraged a separate group of young Catholics to start a refugee outreach like FORM in the western suburbs. This group had helped with FORM visits/Moving Days prior and with delivering hampers. Another highlight was being able to gather past and present volunteers of FORM for a thank you lunch in August to celebrate 4 years of ministering to refugees.

Personally
I could not continue to lead both STAY and FORM, plus run my life as I had for the previous 3 years, with its larger size and complexities. It was a difficult choice on which one to let go. There are many key functions of FORM (mostly relationships with external stakeholders) that make it difficult to hand over responsibility/leadership to someone else and were probably the main drivers behind my decision to continue to lead FORM. There was also an ‘exodus’ of all the experienced FORM leaders due to their own personal commitments/circumstances which left me with the newer FORM leaders to run the outreach ministry.

It was a busy year and like the year before, I was feeling tired towards the end even though I just had FORM, and not STAY, to lead. Trying to support the other ministries in STAY when the need arose also simply added to the busyness. While it is a relief that the year is over, I was reminded by what I had heard a young priest say amidst the flurry of World Youth Day Sydney preparations several years ago: “that to build the Kindgom of God, we should be this busy outside WYD as well”.

Next year will be an even busier time for me as I plan my upcoming nuptials and as I transition to a new vocation of married life. It looks like my time as a Young Adults leader should change and I will be looking for a leader to take over FORM, preferably in the early part of the year. It makes me nervous to hand everything over as there appears to be intricate parts that are not so easily passed on. It is therefore likely that I will be there for support but with less leading.

Final Words
While I have not been so positive about STAY and its progress, on reflection it still continues to have an impact on all who attend. I can see it in how we pray over the people who have to leave Melbourne, in new members continuing to join the group and in the amount of new vocations taken up by its members such as in leadership, joining a ministry and in marriage. STAY is still like a big tree which has grown very big where the birds can come and rest in its branches and which continues to bear great fruit. Please pray with me that God will continue to bless STAY and all its ministries like FORM can help grow this tree so it can receive more new people (birds) and continue to succeed with love, peace and joy (bear fruit).

Wishing you a most blessed Christmas and a joyful new year.

In His love,

Jack