Gulf Pine Catholic

Gulf Pine Catholic • December 25, 2020 7 Thank you, St. Jude, for prayers answered. MLH The Official 2021 Directory of the Diocese of Biloxi $10 Place Your Order Now! To receive your copies, you must pre-order. Deadline for pre-orders Jan. 29, 2021. Delivery March 2021! Directory includes information about diocesan ministries and services, parishes, Mass schedules, schools, priests, deacons, seminarians, sisters, and brothers. Mail coupon & check to: Gulf Pine Catholic, 1790 Popps Ferry Rd., Biloxi, MS 39532 NAME _____________________________________________________ ADDRESS __________________________________________________ CITY________________________ STATE_________ ZIP___________ No. of directories ordered _______ Amount enclosed______ Make checks ($10 per directory) payable to: Gulf Pine Catholic clip & mail # 12-25-20 Thank you, Jesus, Mary and Joseph, St. Jude, Padre Pio, and St. Anthony for prayers answered. DSS Pandemic seen as chance for church ‘to innovate’ ways to engage young adults BY KURT JENSEN Catholic News Service WASHINGTON (CNS) -- There was a recurring theme during a Dec. 7-11 young adult ministry confer- ence: Zoom encounters were adequate in the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic, but they quickly became a poor substitute for in-person ministry and worship. Everyone’s eager for human interactions, and the vaccine can’t arrive soon enough. This sentiment was, not surprisingly, expressed on Zoom . Brian Rhude, the project coordinator for the Catholic Apostolate Center in Washington, used to schedule a weekly Divine Mercy chaplet with friends that way “before everyone got tired of Zoom .” He doesn’t think that would work now. Paul Jarzembowski, an assistant director in the U.S. bishops’ Secretariat of Laity, Marriage, Family Life and Youth, is pictured in Rome in this 2017 photo. Jarzembowski is the secretariat’s assistant director of youth and young adult ministries and lay ecclesial ministry. CNS photo/Junno Arocho Esteves “Simply listen to form relationships with young adults,” he advised. “They’re individuals that come with stories and experiences. They’re beloved sons and daughters of God.” Cynthia De Leon, a volunteer youth minister from San Antonio, said the pandemic isolation gave her “the appreciation of being in a group” and to “just enjoy the little moments, to never take these for granted again.” They were among the participants in the National Leadership Forum on Ministry with Young Adults, hosted by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Secretariat of Laity, Marriage, Family Life and Youth and organized by our National Advisory Team on Young Adult Ministry. According to Paul Jarzembowski, the secretariat’s assistant director of youth and for the U.S. bishops, the forum was originally planned as two-day leadership gathering in New Orleans in early December. But the advisory team, he said, “redeveloped the program into an all-online formation experience for ministry leaders in the church who are seeking ways to better engage and accompany young adults” ages 18 to 39. Participant Kara Dixon, a TV journalist from Portsmouth, Virginia, said she’s had “stronger relation- ships this year due to COVID. One of the things I’ve learned this year is just being present, and just being along for the journey.” “Psychologists will tell you that you form your identity as a child of God in relationships,” said Tracey Lamont, an assistant professor of religious education at Loyola University in New Orleans. De Leon said that hit home for her when she found herself afraid when she simply bumped into a cashier at her supermarket. “You yearn for that, that physical touch, so I think that was just the biggest hit.” Sarah Jarzembowski, the coordinator for campus and young adult ministries for the Archdiocese of Baltimore, said conversations to remind young adults that they have a calling has to start early on and regu- larly.” SEE USCCB LEADERSHIP FORUM YOUNG ADULTS, PAGE 8