By Marco Ceccarelli
This year’s Embrace the Grace (ETG) Youth Conference is set to once again provide youth from across the Archdiocese aged 16 to 30 with the opportunity to explore faith, life and culture through a mixture of talks, workshops, music, drama and prayer.
Over the past 11 years, the conference has attracted more than 600 young people willing to engage with their faith, surrounded by the picturesque New Norcia Benedictine Monastery
A regular attendee who will soon be participating in his tenth ETG is 26-year-old Brad Phillip Joyce. Brad recently met with eRecord journalist Marco Ceccarelli to tell his story.
“When, in 2006, I first came across Embrace the Grace in my parish bulletin, I wasn’t too involved in my faith. Honestly, it wasn’t something that I would’ve gone to on my own accord but, after some convincing from my parents, I attended with some friends,” said Brad, looking back at a time in his life where uncertainty played a large role in his decision making.
“What eventually struck me about the whole event was the diversity of the program. It catered for people of different stages of their faith journey and it exposed me to others who shared my beliefs,” he added.
Initially run by the Respect Life Office and now by Catholic Youth Ministry (CYM), the four-day ETG conference combines thought-provoking presentations by leading speakers on Church teaching with moments of prayer and reflection. This carefully balanced approach appealed to Brad and soon became the kind of spiritual and intellectual nourishment he sought whenever the annual ETG would come up.
“I soon realised that it wasn’t a conference which shied away from the hardest questions; it wanted to get stuck in there with the more debated topics of our time. I found this extremely interesting and noticed that it also equipped me to better argue aspects of the Church’s teachings with those who questioned them.
“The conference also had a side of praise and worship that began to appeal to me. Careful attention was paid to the beauty of the traditional liturgy of the Mass. The Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, for example, was very strong, it was almost the biggest contributing factor to the turning point of my faith journey,” Brad said.
As the years passed, Brad began to mature in faith and could gradually see something invaluable in the ETG presentations.
“I became very excited about listening to speakers such as Anna Krohn, Paul Kelly and Jonathan Doyle. They are all passionate presenters and go into some of the more prominent issues of our time on an intellectual level.
“For example, the explanation of love to will the good of the other: that was a very powerful message to receive considering we live in a society where the idea of love is almost a selfish concept and is not focused on doing things for someone else. That was the first time someone has really explained that to me.
“The speakers are very skilled at slowly narrowing down a complicated concept and at getting down to the reasoning behind the Catholic teaching,” Brad said.
Dwelling on the importance of the ETG conference for today’s youth, Brad stressed that it is fundamental for young people to learn the teachings of the Church, even if they may be at a stage in their life where they are ready not ready to take a complete ‘leap of faith’.
“You don’t have to take that leap to understand Church teaching and theology and intelligence behind it. People in secular society, for some reason, think that religion and logic and science are completely exclusive terms, which is not true.
“The conference helps you to talk to friends who are atheist or agnostic and explain things in terms they can understand. It really breaks down some of the more controversial issues, particularly where people have problems with the Church’s point of view,” he concluded.
Themed Masterpiece: Made in His own Image, Destined to live Forever, this year’s ETG will run from 9-13 December 2015 and will feature an array of speakers from the Archdiocese on topics such as marriage, love, being created in the image of God and much more.
For more information, visit http://cym.com.au/events/masterpiece-etg-2015/ or call Catholic Youth Ministry on 08 9422 7912.