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Existing Chapters
Real Presence
Mostly Holy Angels Youth
Defensor Vitae
Louisville High School Youth
Immaculate Conception
Louisville Young Adults
To start a new chapter,
email us.
Chapter Fundraisers
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Visit our merchandise store
We selling Rosary CD's
for $15 - Contact Sarah Nettleton for more information.
stlbyouthgroup@gmail.com,
502-609-2875
The Generation JPII and Kentucky Youth For Life
Handbook
Most groups rise and fall by the ascension and
departure of gifted individuals. Therefore, for a group to endure, it
must be founded upon something more enduring than its participants.
This is especially the case in youth groups, where only rarely are
individual members present for more than two or three years.
The Kentucky Youth For Life and now Generation
JPII, Inc. have endured because of their commitment to prayer. In
this case, with many of them being Catholic, the binding focus has
been on devotion to Jesus in the Holy Eucharist. They have had
presidents as different from one another as night and day. But through all of that and over the course of seven years, they have
begun and ended every meeting in prayer, and indeed, that fact has
been their fundamental and salvific rule.
This observation leads me to the establishment
of:
Tenet 1: Begin and end
every meeting in prayer.
It is virtually universal that people come to the
pro-life movement because of their religion. Their pro-life
commitment is most often proportional to their commitment to their
faith. So, pro-lifers should be encouraged to gather first in
celebration of their own faiths and second in support of NRLC
or American Life League or whichever other national pro-life
organization you wish to hook up to. Pray first and then begin
working. Jesus clearly said that He would be there wherever two or
more were gathered together in His name. A group with Jesus in it
will be far more effective than one without Him. Secular meetings are
better suited for adults when a need for coordination is imminent.
But for the most part, the battle is over the souls of individuals and
the most effective breeding ground for youth pro-life leaders is in
small faith-based groups. So, how do you encourage those types of
groups to form?
Tenet 2: Do not have too many tenets.
In Kentucky the requirements for the chartering
of a KYFL or Generation JPII Chapter are simple: two teens and one
adult must commit to meeting once a month to pray for the sanctity of
human life. These requirements went into effect during the summer of
2003. Over the next few months, the KYFL grew from one chapter to
three Catholic chapters and one Protestant chapter. All of these
groups are in the 5-15 member size range. That seems to be a good
size to be effective and manageable. Notice that nobody is telling
people how to pray. They are encouraging people to gather together to
pray as they wish and to focus on pro-life endeavors.
The following is a list of practices found to be
successful in Kentucky:
1.
Meet twice a month. Otherwise, continuity from one meeting to
the next is lost. Meeting content should include a faith lesson and a
pro-life educational lesson; these lessons can be either youth or
adult led. Sometimes the meetings will be for planning events or for
working, such as in getting together a mailing. Food is always a plus
and should be a priority!
2.
Promote prayer services. If your group is Catholic, pray
before Jesus in the tabernacle. Promote pro-life Eucharistic Holy
Hours; advertise them for your entire diocese. The KYFL have a
library of such Holy Hours which they would be glad to share. Just
email a request to our
Executive Director. If your group is Protestant, promote other
types of worship services. Encourage youth participation in these
services in a variety of ways: altar service, music, designing fliers,
leading prayers, reading scripture, handing out programs, planning the
service, etc. These prayer services will bond and enflame the youth
and will also be inspirational to adults.
3.
Obtain a youth website. Make pages on it available for each
chapter in your state.
4.
Encourage the groups to support a local Walk For Life. They
can do this by sending out mailings, walking, decorating the walk
site, designing the T-shirts, inviting their friends, etc.
5.
Encourage the groups to journey to the National March For Life
and the National Right To Life Convention or similar things.
Encourage adults to help fund these often life-changing pilgrimages.
6.
Encourage prayer witnessing at the local abortuary.
7.
Make sure that everything is an expression of love and mercy,
especially for those who are most difficult to love or forgive.
Criticizing church or political leaders is not productive. Focus on
the positive.
8.
When a youth wants to do something good, support her; it might
not be exactly the way you might do things, but put some gas in the
tank so they can get there. Do not ever give a youth reason for
disillusionment…they get disappointed with adults enough just by
watching TV.
Tenet 3: Attitude is
everything!
There are two attitudes in particular which I
would like to address: that of the adult sponsor and that of the youth
members. When both are in line, grace explodes into the world through
both the youth and the adults, but when one or both are off, the flow
of grace is much constricted.
Ideal Attitudes of an Adult Sponsor:
1.
Don’t get hyper when youth are doing things that are not really
wrong, but are just different or annoying.
2.
Let the youth do as much as possible their own way, but still
have the strength to step in and take unpopular corrective action if
necessary when things are going seriously wrong.
3.
Do not worry so much about results, but much more about effort
knowing that nothing is ever wasted in the service of God.
4.
Be open to calls or correspondence from the youth at any time.
5.
Be generous with the checkbook from time to time. Make the
youth your favorite charity.
Ideal Attitudes of Youth Members:
1.
Be mature enough to understand that this group is not a game,
that every minute we pray and work together might be the minute that
saves a life.
2.
Be mature enough to understand that adults are not enemies,
that this is a great opportunity to learn how to work with adults and
to gain what they know, that they will soon be an adult, that full
respect from adults is achievable, but is to be earned through the
labor of service rather than handed out due to personal favoring.
3.
Be mature enough to throw aside any considerations of
popularity or social power or manipulation. Be mature enough to
respect every person in the group, no matter who they are, as one’s
equal and as a brother or sister in Christ.
4.
Consider that this group is not third or fourth on their list,
but comes right after academics. They should be thinking about how to
upset the status quo, how to call attention to the plight of the weak
so as to educate the public or to make the public uncomfortable so
they have to think about these unpleasant things, how to draw more
people to the Way and the Truth and the Life. They should call the
adult sponsor to talk over their ideas before forgetting them as they
might be very good ideas indeed.
Ideal Attitudes of both Youth Members and Adult
Sponsors:
1.
Committed to deepening their love of Jesus Christ in the
Blessed Sacrament for the rest of their lives.
2.
Honestly begging Christ to use them as He wishes.
3.
Frequently using confession to maintain and strengthen one’s
purity and to remain in a state of grace wherein more good things can
happen.
4.
Grateful to be used by God to protect and serve the weakest.
5.
Joyful to have been given the grace to be pro-life!
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