Planning Ahead for the Seasons

During Advent, I am planning for the Lent and Easter season. When Ash Wednesday arrives, summer ministries and programming are on my desktop. The quiet patterns of Ordinary Time are anything but quiet as I recruit volunteers, plot a calendar for the school year, and weave ministries, programs, and family into what looks on paper to be a manageable response to a full and fulfilling life.

Last month in Kansas City, we were present for the National Catholic Youth Conference (NCYC). Months of planning and coordinating culminated in three days of faith, challenge, and the blessing of being with our young church as they gathered en masse. What an experience to be in the moment during that event! Away from office phones, e-mail, and other distractions, NCYC offered the unique opportunity of ministering in the moment. Being present and gifted by an experience, moving forward in faith and ministry in real time are important to my personal spiritual development.

NACYML Present and Future

Current NACYML activities include the launching of the OnCourse series of Webinars (522 KB), planning for the annual Leadership Team meeting in January, and the biennial Membership Meeting during the National Conference on Catholic Youth Ministry (NCCYM) in New Orleans in 2010.

Planning ahead and living in the moment also involves reflecting on the past. This January will mark the end of my time with the NACYML Leadership Team. Two years of planning preceded the launching of NACYML at NCCYM in Pittsburgh in 2004. Those were years of looking to needs, being affirmed by the membership of the NFCYM, discerning a mission, and building a structure. That original leadership group held in tension the needs of the present and the potential of the future.

In the past six years, NACYML has grown in membership, in leadership, in challenge, and in potential. Current membership is approximately 500. Four new groups of discerned members have been welcomed to the NACYML Leadership Team. The needs of our members continue to be addressed through this newsletter, the NACYML website, and the Facebook and LinkedIn social networking sites. Our continued collaboration with Ministry Training Source brings NACYML members opportunities for online education and formation through the OnCourse program. NACYML continues to support the Catholic Youth Foundation, USA.

These are a few of the ways in which NACYML works and lives in the present while planning for the future. As a member of this group, my present planning involves a discernment for future involvement with this association which has provided work, vision, and blessing in my own ministry for the past eight years. As a member of this same association, please spend some time in building the future direction of NACYML while benefiting from your membership in the present.