ICYC

There were conspicuous absences at the Idaho Catholic Youth Conference this weekend. Sleep? Lacking. Meat? None of it on Friday. Worries? Melted away. Defenses? Down after a few hours.

The result was an environment open to worship, the movement of the Holy Spirit, authentic friendship, and encounter with the living God. Retreats are focused times away from the obstacles of discipleship. Everyone needs periodic renewal and refocus. For teens experiencing this environment for the first time, the immersion is overwhelming and incredible.

In their written responses on Saturday night, many of the teens in my group wrote about their surprise. Surprise at God's presence. Surprise at the immense sense of community in a crowd of 1,600. Surprise at how much they enjoyed the entire program. Surprise at the relevance of the message. Surprise at their sudden openness to God's will and transformative work.

The entire weekend is laid out to ease participants into a journey. There's a reason they want everyone to be tired by Saturday night--God meets us in our vulnerability, when we can't construct the walls to barricade us from our vulnerabilities anymore. We are before the Lord, and God meets us as we are.

Now that the encounter has occurred, the trick is realizing that though the Lord wants us in our current state, we are loved too much to remain there. The journey, the growth, the discipleship has only begun.