Teenagers and young adults serving at St. John’s Summer Program at St. John Francis Regis Parish in Hollywood, Maryland, told the Catholic Standard what draws young people to the Church and gives them a reason to stay.
They talked about friends who invited them, Catholics they admired, communities where they felt at home and moments that helped the faith become their own.
For many, those experiences helped them come to know Christ personally.
Start with an invitation.
Several of the young people at St. John’s said they found their way into Catholic community because someone invited them or encouraged them to come.
Betsy Pieniadz, 19, came from New Mexico after hearing about the program through people connected to St. John’s. Ethan Lansing, 18, learned about it from a friend at Ave Maria University in Florida.
Carmen Davidson, 21, arrived from Baylor University in Texas after a friend urged her to apply, while Caroline Grifone, 21, came from Pennsylvania through people already connected to the program.
Authentic relationships matter.
Grifone said young people need to meet Catholics whose faith is part of their everyday lives.
“I met people who were involved in their faith but were also athletic, fun and outgoing,” she said. “That drew me in.”
Pieniadz said negative experiences with Catholics had caused her to drift away from the Church.
“Then I came here and met people who really lived their faith,” she said.
Addie Lyons, 19, said relationships can make young people more open to the faith. Rather than beginning with a theology talk, she said, counselors build friendships, have fun with the children and let questions about faith come naturally.
Build a place where they belong.
Rachel Mroz, 22, became more involved in her faith through the Catholic Student Center at the University of Maryland and returned to St. John’s looking for that same kind of community during the summer.
She said young Catholics need people around them who encourage them in the faith, “other people who want to run to heaven with us.”
Rollins Don-Simmons, 19, said the community at St. John’s gave him confidence to seek out Catholic life at the University of Maryland.
For Summer Phan, 16, and Maria Northrup, 17, older staff members offered an example to follow. Both saw teenagers and college students return year after year, showing them what staying active in the faith could look like as they grew older.
Teach the faith so they can understand it.
Don-Simmons said parishes hoping to reach young people should think carefully about how they communicate the faith.
“I think we can best engage young people in the faith by explaining the faith in a way that they can understand,” he said.
Carlton Costanzo, 17, made a similar point.
“Stay rooted in our tradition while also presenting it in a way that's accessible to younger generations,” he said.
Christopher Damron, 19, said young people respond when the faith is explained clearly and in a way they can understand.
Keep Christ at the center.
Many pointed to the Eucharist as central to Catholic life.
Lansing said helping young people understand what happens at Mass can change the way they see the Church.
“If more people really understood what is happening at Mass and believed it with their whole hearts, I think it would completely change the way they look at the Catholic faith,” he said.
Hannah Lawrence, 29, said friendships first brought her to St. John’s, but daily Mass and Eucharistic Adoration helped transform her faith.
Help them ask what God wants for their lives.
Several also spoke about faith in terms of vocation and discernment.
Pieniadz said she initially did not want to come to St. John’s, but eventually believed God was asking her to go.
“God called me to,” she said. “God told me to.”
Lansing had spent months asking St. Joseph the Worker to help him find a summer job before his friend told him about St. John’s.
“This was the opportunity that opened up,” he said. “I took it as God showing me where He wanted me to be.”
Costanzo is considering college, military service, the trades and priesthood as he discerns his future.
“I think every Catholic man should be open to the possibility of seminary until he’s called to marriage,” he said.
For the young people at St. John’s, faith has grown through friendships, invitations and the example of people who took their relationship with Christ seriously.
And many of them are now doing the same for someone else.
See how St. John’s Summer Program builds a Catholic community where young people learn to follow, lead and help one another toward heaven.
