Audrey Lawrence and Karen Luyendyk from the diocesan All My Relations Circle facilitated. “We all benefited by Austin Ward’s participation as our Indigenous witness,” Luyendyk told Crosstalk. Ward started the day with a Smudge and teaching about smudging. He also spoke about his experience in a residential school. “Austin is in his early forties which truly brought home the legacy of discrimination and how recently the institutions were in operation,” she said. “We also benefitted from Austin’s young son Jaylen’s enthusiastic participation. When we went round the circle at the end, Jaylen expressed with great energy and a huge smile his pride in his Indigenous heritage and his excitement that all of us were there and that we are all learning about his heritage. I for one had tears when he shared, and I’m sure others did too.”

Reflecting on the exercise Eleonore Brunelle, commented: “I don’t think it’s necessarily true that the stories of Indigenous people are excluded in the academic curriculum many high school students are learning from textbooks, but they are definitely…filtered.”

Sydney Sharpe said the mapping exercise “gave me new information about the First Nations people and taught me some history that I didn’t know, like the Doctrine of Discovery and the population of Canada before colonization. I feel like it was beneficial to have this experience, so I have a better understanding of some of the struggles of Indigenous peoples.”

—Staff with files from Donna Rourke

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This YIP year we welcome nine new interns and have welcomed back one. Please meet:

Daniel is taking a gap year this year and is interested in psychology, business, leadership and coaching soccer. He is fascinated by the psychology of trauma. He wants to help people improve their psychological state as he believes in equality on more than a materialistic level—that we need to establish equality on a psychological level, so that everybody can have the ability to be happy. 

Deborah is a Grade 12 student and a second-year intern with YIP. With a passion for visual expression and a new interest in architecture, Deborah is interested in creating art by manipulating the viewer’s space using forms, colours, and sizes. She is looking for more opportunities to explore art in her community. This year, Deborah chose to continue her placement at Extendicare Starwood so she can interact with more people of diverse backgrounds. …Being a new member of All Saints’ Westboro Anglican Church, she has quickly engaged with volunteering at the food bank and the New-to-You shop. These opportunities are helping to develop a deeper sense of empathy for those living in different circumstances and recognition of her own privilege. Deborah’s goal with YIP this year is to acquire mediation and facilitator skills in conflict management and organizational strategies in time management between hobbies, commitments, and school responsibilities.

Emmet is an active member of his faith community St James Carleton Place. Emmet is currently attending Confederation College and is taking the social service worker program with a bridging program into a bachelor of social work. 

James is a second-year student at the University of Ottawa doing a major in political science with a minor in public administration. He applied to YIP to gain practical experience in areas he is passionate about [politics, environmental justice, writing (especially essay writing), and social justice], to strengthen his connection with the Ottawa and Anglican community, and to deepen his connection with his Anglican faith and God. Those aims are difficult to fulfill in environments where learning is often deeply impersonal and very theoretical. His work placement is with Citizen for Public Justice. 

Li Xiu is a student at the University of Ottawa and a returning YIP intern. Li looks forward to actively participating in group events as well as the new work placement. Li is the YIP intern for the Anti-Racism Forum organizing team. Li enjoys wandering the city and finding delicious food spots or cooking with friends.

Malachai is a high school student and member of the LGBTQ+ community who enjoys reading and the creative arts.

Nana is the YIP intern for St Columba Anglican Church. In this role, Nana will act as their outreach resource coordinator, researching, analyzing and identifying outreach activities to determine if existing programs should be maintained, expanded or dropped; and if new outreach activities would have a more expansive and positive impact on the surrounding community.  

Rebecca is currently in her fourth and final year of a Human Kinetics degree at the University of Ottawa. A member of St. John the Evangelist Anglican Church, she is honored to serve on their Parish Council and to be the Diocese of Ottawa’s youth delegate to General Synod this summer in Calgary. Originally from Vancouver she was very involved in her childhood parish as the Head of the Server’s Guild, a youth delegate to Diocesan Synod, an Outreach Committee member and a church-school teacher. She is looking forward to participating in YIP to make connections with other youth throughout the diocese and gain new skills and experiences through her placement. 

Thomas is a first-year student at Carleton University and wants to become a social worker. He applied to YIP to develop leadership and communication skills. Social justice is important to Thomas as he wants to live in a society where everyone is respected, included and safe. He would like to see high quality and affordable therapy to be available to everyone who needs it. Thomas also loves learning about new topics and having in-depth discussions with people. Thomas will be doing his work placement with Centre 454.

Zara (AKA Theodora) is a first-year student at the University of Ottawa studying finance. She is the second daughter in a family of four siblings. Zara is doing her work placement at the Glebe Wellness Centre. Her older sister Alexis was a YIP intern for the last two years. 

If you have any questions about the Youth Internship Program, please email me at donna-rourke@ottawa.anglican.ca

Youth Ministry:

The KAIROS blanket Exercise has been re-scheduled to Saturday Feb. 25 at St Aidan’s Anglican Church. For information and to register please email donna-rourke@ottawa.anglican.ca 

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The Rev. Dr. Mary-Cate Garden, who is part of our Youth Internship Program (YIP) team of advisors, offered this proud reflection:

“The YIP representatives ‘won’ this year’s Synod. In a year which saw a very full Synod—a very mindful Synod—where delegates had worked hard on the Diocesan discernment process. In a room full of people continuing to work together, thoughtfully and faithfully, the YIP representative stood out. In a room full of delegates who brought their A game, the YIP folks brought their A+ game.

As I listened to the thoughtful, loving, challenging reflections that each of these young(er) Anglicans offered I was in awe. A group that is so often labelled as ‘youth’ and so often thought of as an homogenous group called on the Church to be their best selves and begin to listen to younger voices. To recognize the diversity of experiences that the youth bring to us and to make sure that not only were they invited to the table but that they were invited as full participants.

The YIP presentations were brave and hopeful and full of promise If this is what lies ahead and if the church is wise enough to listen to these voices, then it is a church that will be in good and exciting hands for a long time to come.”   

Here’s a sampling of the thoughts they shared with Synod or reflections on the experience afterwards. 

Deborah said that she was born and baptized in Geneva and confirmed in Ottawa in the Evangelical Lutheran Church. … As an artist, she created a piece of art Friday night to reflect on Synod and the church. It spoke to her desire to feel like she belongs; that there were people who look and sound like her.

“Thank you very much for letting me come to my first synod. My message to you is ‘Try something new.’ Try new music or a new prayer in service because you don’t know how much that means to [a person who might be new to the church or to Canada].

She shared a moving story about her mom, the Rev. Chung Yan Lam. “Something special about my mom. She’s a priest here… She sings a beautiful Mandarin song at the end of her services…My grandma always asks her ‘Why do you sing in Mandarin? ‘Nobody understands.’ It’s so that she also feels like she is wanted in that service, that she has a part of herself in that service. …I hope that in the future we continue to grow and we continue to make our church like a home because it is not only a house of God, it is a home with God.”

Maritsa wrote that “as a new Canadian, she thinks that the Diocese is heading in the right direction with Motion P3A and P3B and welcomes the idea of creating new worshipping spaces particularly for Global Christians. She feels very strongly that creating spaces where new Canadians feel welcome and included and can feel like they belong is so important. She would like to be able to hear the language and music of ‘home.’ She also feels that anti-racism education at a parish level is crucial. She understands that many people don’t realize their words are unwelcoming to people who are new to Canada and she would like to see everyone working towards self-awareness.  

Learning about the National Church’s plan to have an Indigenous church under the umbrella of Anglican Church of Canada, she was concerned that the Anglican Church will still have the final say, which would defeat the point. She is proud, however, that we are moving in the right direction and that we seem to have an open mind about this issue. 

Rebecca is a member of Synod for St. John the Evangelist, a YIP intern, and the General Synod youth delegate from the Diocese of Ottawa. Hearing the aim of engaging more young people in Anglican communities discussed, she offered this advice: “Youth and young adults …are people like everyone else and we have the same core desires including to belong, to be respected and to become our best selves. But we are different in one key way: We are figuring out who we want to be and what we can do for the first time in our lives. We need spaces to learn and grow through new experiences and opportunities. We need to feel that who we are, our ideas, knowledge and perspective, is respected and valued. This is not achieved through token gestures and acknowledgement but through deep engagement and connection. A starting place for this is having youth members of Diocesan Synod. This is far from a token gesture, youth member votes have equal weight to every other member of Synod; equal standing, equal voice. 

She added that the work that the Indigenous church is doing to make the gospel explicitly part of their founding documents is a model that we should all think about when we make policy and documents within the church.” 

Aimerance and Alexis were unable to attend all of Synod because of exams and assignments, but they both said they liked what Deborah had shared about incorporating different kinds of music to allow the church to feel like home. They are both in favor of Motion 3A and encouraged everyone to seriously consider global worshipping spaces.

Robert wrote: “I was really happy to hear about the pathway that our diocese is looking to follow. I think that the focus on new parish structures is an excellent opportunity to use our creativity to help restructure. I am happy to see that parishes will be guided to make the changes that are in the best interest of their parishioners and communities. Robert also wondered what more could be done to help guide younger people in their own personal spiritual development within the church. 

Robyn, a young adult member of Synod for St Albans, said the Shape of Parish Ministry motions fill her with hope; especially motion three….Robyn feels that we must learn to trust our abilities and trust that the Holy Spirit is working in us and our parishes. 

Robyn admired the Primate, Archbishop Linda Nicholls’ willingness to candidly address tensions at the Lambeth Conference regarding same-sex marriage. “She provided some helpful context and reminded us that we are part of the wider Anglican Communion. Being part of this Communion, like being part of a diocese, means that we choose to come together and acknowledge our connection in Christ, despite the many differences we have. This is a beautiful thing. However, we are also in communion with all the many LGBTQ+ folks around the world who are continuously harmed by our religious leaders, and I think that the Primate could have been a bit more pastoral toward these people. I am thankful to be part of an affirming Diocese that is relatively safe for LGBTQ+ folks, but it can still be so painful and heartbreaking to see this fight still being fought in other places around Canada and the wider Communion. I want to remind all members of the LGBTQ+ community within the Anglican Communion that they are beloved even when their leaders fail them.”

Heather Maclachlan, a member of Synod from Trinity, echoed the Archbishop Nicholls pronouncement: “These youth are not the leaders of tomorrow, they are the leaders of today.”

Donna Rourke is Animator of Youth Ministries and YIP. 

The post Young adults shine bright at Synod 2022 appeared first on Perspective.

Registration is required for all participants by Nov. 6. We will provide snacks, drinks and lunch.

We must have at least 15 youth or young adults registered to participate and up to a maximum of 50.

A bit of background from Kairos:

Developed in collaboration with Indigenous Elders, Knowledge Keepers and educators, the KAIROS Blanket Exercise (KBE) is an interactive and experiential teaching tool that explores the historic and contemporary relationship between Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples in the land we now know as Canada.

During this two to three-hour workshop, participants step on blankets representing the land and into the role of First Nations, Inuit and Métis peoples. They are guided by trained facilitators, including Indigenous Elders and Knowledge Keepers, who work from a script that covers pre-contact, treaty-making, colonization, resistance and much more. Participants read scrolls and respond to cues in the script. The KBE concludes with a debriefing, conducted as a talking circle, during which participants discuss the learning experience, process their feelings, ask questions, share insights, and deepen their understanding.

For more information and to register for this event, please email Donna at donna-rourke@ottawa.anglican.ca

For more information about the KAIROS Blanket Exercise 

https://www.kairoscanada.org/what-we-do/indigenous-rights/blanket-exercise

https://www.kairosblanketexercise.org/who-should-do-the-kbe/

We are so thankful to the ‘Say Yes to Kids’ campaign of the Anglican Foundation of Canada for their generous funding of this event.

Youth Internship Program (YIP)

Watch this space next month to be introduced to our 12 new interns and  for some pictures of the ‘Welcome to YIP” gathering held Saturday Oct. 1 when our 12 new interns met each other, the Faith Formation Team and some of our amazing Leadership session facilitators.   

The post Kairos Blanket Exercise appeared first on Perspective.

We offered our interns the option of joining us in person or joining virtually for our sessions trying to be as inclusive to as many of the interns as possible. Our primary goal always is to build community and create a feeling of belonging. 

Our interns have been enjoying learning and working in a variety of different placements that have included: Ottawa Art Therapy Group, Enriched Support Program at Carleton University, YIP’s faith formation and leadership team, Centre 454, Starwood, L’Arche, Glebe Wellness Centre, the Synod Office and the Nations Planning team of CLAY.  

We welcomed facilitators to discuss unconscious bias, anti- racism, mental health, developing critical thinking skills, 2SLGBTQ+ & gender diversity, and basic financial literacy for our leadership skills development and still have navigating difficult conversation, understanding empathy and networking left to learn about. We will be offering SafeTALK (SafeTALK is learning how to prevent suicide by recognizing signs, engaging someone, and connecting those to an intervention resource for further support. Funding for this comes to us courtesy of the Johanniter Humanitarian Group.

We have met monthly to discuss our faith and our own faith expressions and journeys with our faith formation team. Together our participants learn to be a part of a community, journeying together in faith; learning  how they each respond to God in a way and context that is truly their own. They explore concepts and engaged in transformative conversations that are amazingly wonderfully to be a part of.

We are planning a weekend retreat in June for the interns and mentors at Gracefield Camp for more opportunities for connecting, relationship building and engaging about faith. It is our hope that Bishop Shane may be able to join us for a few hours to engage with the interns and respond to their ‘burning questions.’ 

Look for more about our 2021-2022 interns and some reflections from them on their experiences in the September issue of Crosstalk.

Applications are open for the new YIP year; September 2022-June 2023.  The form is available at the diocesan website:

https://www.ottawa.anglican.ca/images/yip/YIP-application.pdf

To watch the new YIP video, please go to: 

We are always looking for people to participate in YIP, young people to be interns, people to be a part of our prayer team and people to mentor our young people. If you think you might be interested in being a part of YIP or you think that your parish could offer an opportunity for an intern to do a work placement, I would love to talk to you; we could Zoom, chat on the phone or email.

http://www.ottawa.anglican.ca/index.php/yip

Donna Rourke may be reached at 

donna-rourke@ottawa.anglican.ca

613-612-3674 or 232-7124 Ext. 220

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In December, the Youth Internship Program (YIP) followed the instructions in the diocesan COVID Communique and moved from in person to online gatherings. Work placements wherever possible moved to be placements done from home. Our second anti-racism leadership session happened on Zoom instead of in person at St Aidan’s, as did our Faith Formation session on Jan, 3. 

We continue to meet via zoom for our sessions and recently, we met for a very timely session on mental health.  Until the Diocese moves from our Modified Stage Red protocols, we will continue to meet virtually for all YIP related activities. 

We received funding from the Johanniter Humanitarian Group and All Saints Greely to cover the cost of eight YIP participants to take ASK (Assessing Suicide in Kids). This workshop is able to be delivered virtually and will take place Feb. 3 and 4. Unfortunately we have to re-schedule SafeTALK and very likely ASIST (Applied Suicide Intervention Skills Training) as these workshops must be delivered in person. https://www.talktoolstraining.com/applied-suicide-intervention-skills-training-asist  and https://www.talktoolstraining.com/safetalk

The Johanniter Humanitarian Group will be covering the cost of both those workshops for YIP participants. 

During this time of isolation, we are taking advantage of technology to bring us closer together by meeting weekly to check in, playing games, offering prayers and attending Zoom or Uber conference Church with each other. We plan to participate in a Lenten film series called 12Neighbors:  https://www.12neighborsfilms.com/aboutus. We have extended an invitation to the YIP mentors to join us both at zoom church and the film series. 

We so have lots to be look forward to; Bishop Shane will be attending our Faith Formation session in May, and we continue to plan for our weekend retreat at Gracefield Christian Camp and Retreat Centre in June. 

If you have any questions about YIP or think you might be interested in being a participant or hosting an intern for a work placement, please do not hesitate to reach out to me. 

The post Pivoting and looking forward to spring appeared first on Perspective.

This new year of the Youth Internship Program (YIP) is off to a great start. 

Our Faith Formation team includes me, our intern, Aimerance, and the Reverends Arran Thorpe, Geoff Chapman and Mary-Cate Garden. Our leadership facilitation team is led by Breanna Pizzuto of Talk Tools, and she will be joined by Susan Young and Mylène Côté. 

The privilege is mine to introduce you to some of this year’s interns. Please meet:

Naomi is returning to YIP for a second year and is looking forward to building more lasting relationships. She is doing her work placement with the National Planning team for CLAY 2022. 

Jane is a grade 11 student at Holy Trinity in Kanata. Some of her interests include interior design, architecture and culinary arts. She enjoys cooking, baking, taking photos, listening to music and watching movies. She is also a dancer, piano-player, oldest sister of four, and babysitter. This summer, she worked as a camp counselor at Circle Square Ranch at Big Clear Lake. Jane is looking forward to the new experiences and knowledge she will receive during her work placement at the Bishop’s office working with Heidi Fawcett on event planning. 

Fares is a 17-year-old student at Brookfield High School and is from a family of seven.  Fares likes to walk, ride his bike, swim and play video games. He also likes to watch Turkish TV shows and soccer. Fares is excited to be working at the Glebe Wellness Centre.

Étienne is a Gr. 12 student at Lisgar Collegiate Institute, where his primary academic interest lies in creative writing, a subject he hopes to pursue in university. He is fluent in English, French, and German and studied Latin at his elementary school. Étienne also enjoys athletics, participating in the school’s cross-country running, Nordic skiing, and track and field teams. As for employment experience, he once operated a local paper route and has also volunteered at a soup kitchen with his church. Finally, Étienne has a fascination for trains, and his obsession for Star Trek has resulted in him being the head of his school’s Star Trek club. Étienne will be doing his work placement with Centre 454. 

Deborah is a Gr. 11 student at Canterbury High School with a passion for visual arts. She enjoyed art at an early age. Finding beauty in art forms leads her to find beauty in the world around her. Having grown up in the Christian faith, Deborah is looking for ways to help others through art. She is looking forward to developing her leadership skills and presence as a “strong female lead” and is inspired by her mom’s various roles in the local and national church. Deborah aspires to lead within Girl Guides of Canada. She is looking forward to working with a diverse group of people and hopes to strengthen her communication skills in her work placement as the YIP intern at the Ottawa Art Therapy Centre. In YIP, she hopes for new experiences and new relationships, to develop a deeper sense of faith and self-understanding with colleagues and mentors, and to have fun!

Claire is in grade 11 at De la Salle High School. She worships at St. Alban and St Bernard Anglican church on Sunday mornings. This past summer, Claire was a camper counsellor at a summer camp for children with autism. Claire will be the YIP intern for L’Arche, an international federation of faith-based communities, creating homes and day programs with people who have developmental disabilities. Claire is looking forward to learning with the L’Arche community and within the Youth Internship Program.

Aimerance is a YIP intern doing her placement with the YIP leadership and faith formation team. She is a student at the University of Ottawa studying Psychology. She enjoys reading, dancing, and having fun with her friends and family. She is passionate about helping others and sharing the gospel and the love of Jesus Christ with the world. She is looking forward to learning and experiencing new things this year with YIP.

Alexis is doing a second year with YIP. Her work placement is in the Enriched Support Program Department at Carleton University. Alexis thinks this is so amazing because she also goes to school there and is learning a lot of skills that will be helpful in the future. She is working with the most amazing people. Alexis is studying engineering. 

In addition to being coached and participating in Faith Formation and Leadership sessions, each intern is offered the opportunity to work with their own Christian/work mentor. The idea for our interns having a Christian mentor/ work mentor comes from 3 places:

In their exit interviews, our first cycle of interns said having their own mentors would have made the program better. 

We want to help develop inter-generational relationships between youth and adults. In our exit interviews, 60% of all our alumni rate their relationship with their mentor as very high and important to them.

Finally, one of lectures I attended during Ask and Imagine; hosted by the Faculty of Theology at Huron University in 2016. The research from the lecture was based on a 2004 study which looked at the factors that made a difference to the 19-21% of young people who continue to identify with the church after the age of 21. Spencer Edwards, a guest lecturer, stated that the number two factor was having adult Christian mentors engaging, connecting and relationship building with them.

Watch for pictures next month from our Faith Formation, Leadership sessions and maybe even a mentor gathering. 

If you have any questions about the Youth Internship Program, please email me at donna-rourke@ottawa.anglican.ca

The post Meet our interns for 2021-2022 appeared first on Perspective.

We began a new year of the Youth Internship Program (YIP) with a day retreat at the beautiful parish of St. Aidan’s and want to thank the parish for generously allowing us to gather in their wonderful space.

This year we have 10 interns participating in the Youth Internship Program:  Alex, Claire, Deborah, Étienne, Fares, Jane and Theodora, with Aimé, Ujuamara (Alex) and Naomi returning for a second time. 

The Rev. Geoff Chapman and the Rev. Arran Thorpe continue to be part of our Faith Formation Team, and Breanna Pizzuto from Talk Tools is the main leadership facilitator.

Bishop Shane joined us for the morning. The Rev. Jonathan Askwith spent the day with us as a member of the YIP Advisory Committee. The Rev. Rosemary Parker dropped by to welcome us to St Aidan’s, and Breanna Pizzuto joined us in the later part of the afternoon. 

We were also joined by Maritsa and Lauren, two of our alumni.  Lauren was our photographer for the day. 

Although the weather was rainy, and we had to make a few adjustments to our plans for the day, everyone had fun and enjoyed the opportunity to build our relationships and create our YIP community. 

In the next edition of Crosstalk, I will introduce each of the interns. We are hopeful that when we meet for our first leadership session on unconscious bias all of our interns will be able to join us. 

The post Youth Interns meet at the start of their 2021-2022 journey appeared first on Perspective.

Journeying with these young people is such a privilege! Here are some excerpts from thoughts they shared.

You can see why I love my job! 

Donna Rourke
Youth Ministry Animator

Maritsa
YIP intern for St. John the Baptist

Early July 2021, at the beginning of the week, I got a reminder on my phone saying my YIP exit interview is this week. I suddenly felt sad and didn’t feel that I am ready for this to be over yet! YIP has been a big part of my life, and I started thinking of ways and things I can offer to benefit the program! For example, being a mentor or on the panel interview etc. I just am not ready to not be part of the Youth Internship Program.

Through my YIP time, Donna has encouraged and  supported me through every obstacle until I was being heard and seen in my community. As a young person who is part of a community that adults run, it was difficult to be seen and heard as an equal, but I was treated like an equal in the end of my internship.

I grew up in a Christian family and community where no questions are asked; we are just supposed to follow the priest and what the Bible says. This year’s faith formation sessions helped me unpack my faith and be able to ask the big questions. I learned that faith is not just as simple as attending church every Sunday! And just like an onion, I was able to peel back layer by layer to get to the truth and be able to find answers to the questions that I was never supposed to ask.

In the faith formation sessions, I was able to be who I am and be true to myself. During our faith formation sessions, I learned that faith is not a room that has four walls; it is a huge playground that has no limits, and it comes in various shapes and forms and colours and heights.

Emily
YIP Intern for PWRDF

Having a mentor, a person dedicated to listening, providing advice, and bringing new perspectives is quite possibly the part of the program I will miss most. Facetiming with my mentor every couple of weeks and letting her into my world [made me feel] vulnerable at the beginning, but it was so rewarding as we both shared life with each other. To have someone looking out for my well-being, someone to also talk about the YIP program with, and to hear the faith perspectives of someone a little older than was invaluable to my growth throughout this program. …

Faith Formation sessions were grace-filled and the love put into the content of these discussions was so evident. We discussed all things, Hell, does it exist? Who goes there? How could a loving God use this imagery? We discussed what faith looks like in action. What does praying look like? What could praying look like? We discussed what beliefs we were taught growing up in church or have learned that maybe don’t serve us anymore. What beliefs do we hold with a closed hand? Which ones could we hold with an open one? A belief I know I hold with a closed hand is that I am God’s beloved. A belief I came to discover that I hold with an open hand is that Jesus was a white man, the way He is often depicted in iconography. These sessions created space for questions I was holding as a young adult and a chance to explore things I hadn’t thought about yet, allowing myself to be grounded in my faith further. This conversation was so relevant to my life that I often asked my mentor, my church friends, and my current small group the same questions. 

On Leadership sessions: Leadership sessions were SO awesome!! From sessions about confronting anti-black racism, to how to navigate casual and stressful conversations, to sessions on mental health, and gender diversity, I was always left with so much to learn and act on. These sessions left me feeling informed, empowered, and brave. The discussion questions in the Leadership Sessions were always incredibly thoughtful, intentional, and authentic, which bred fantastic discussion. In breakout rooms we were able to dream, ask, and imagine what the world might look like if we cared for our bodies and minds more, if we put aside and investigated biases, and shared God’s love with the world more. The leaders of these sessions were consistently enthusiastic about the topic bringing a contagious energy that I could always feel. 

Being able to be part of an organization doing such wonderful work like the Primate’s World Relief and Development Fund, was such a glorious opportunity! I was able to join a small team of young people within the organization working to share the stories of PWRDF through a podcast. I learned lessons in communicating with a team, the pace things need to happen to ensure full inclusion of all members, and how to create a podcast episode from start to finish!! It is inspiring to think back eight months ago [when I had] nothing but a blank Google Doc and now to have podcast episodes on Spotify is crazy! YIP’s consistent connection with my supervisor was also vital to my success in this placement. 

Overall, the Youth Internship was an enriching, dedicated, and fantastic program for young people to be a part of. Donna, the leader of the program, was available any time I wanted to check in, reflect on life or the things we were learning, or pray over something happening in my life. The prayer team was a powerful source of inspiration and strength, being able to exercise this faith muscle and pray for the people in the YIP community and know they were also praying for me. Every leader in the program I encountered was excited to be there and also explained concepts with relevant examples for young people. 

Naomi
YIP intern for Children’s Ministry St Alban

YIP was a positive experience for me. I learned many valuable skills that will definitely help me in future professional settings. I really appreciated the Leadership and Faith Formation sessions, particularly a session where we got to meet the bishop. What I appreciated most about that session was how approachable and how ‘near to us’ the bishop was. Bishops are often seen as being somehow ‘far away’ from us individuals, almost inaccessible. However, inviting him to one of the Faith sessions deconstructed that belief. Personally for me, one of the best parts of YIP was learning through the relationships developed with my supervisor, Donna and my coworkers. Coming back to YIP for a second year, I am looking forward to more relationship building.

Caleb
YIP Intern for KAIROS

YIP provides all interns with a safe environment where we are encouraged to share opinions with one another. 

The faith formation sessions provided a great chance for me to restore my faith during the pandemic as it gave me the opportunity to speak freely and ask questions.  

YIP has taught me how to manage my time and become more organized in a professional manner in a workplace environment  

In the midst of the pandemic YIP faith formation and leadership sessions gave me something to look forward to, by speaking with my fellow interns and learning as we went along. 

Callum
YIP Faith Formation Intern

YIP helped keep me grounded in my last year of high school, it brought stability in a chaotic time.

YIP convinced me that I am valued within the diocese and the church and I will be eternally grateful for that understanding.

Alex
YIP Intern for the Glebe Wellness Centre

For anyone who is considering going into YIP, …my advice for you would be to do it. You meet a lot of other amazing people, especially Donna. She is always there for you to support you and all round one of the most amazing people you’ll ever meet. You get a lot of experience and a lot of lessons about things that you are definitely going to need in the future. I learned a lot of things. Going into YIP was definitely one of the best decisions I ever made.

Freddy
YIP Intern for the Parish of Bearbrook-Navan-Blackburn

Being a part of the YIP program this past year has had a huge impact on me. … Getting to discuss our faith and [how to navigate] difficult conversations helped me step outside my comfort zone and discuss the topics that aren’t usually brought up. Having a chance to meet other youth and my mentor kept up the social aspect of my life during a time where we all had to stay at home. The work placement was tremendously helpful as it gave me real life experience in the work field that I now can use for the future. 

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