Youth Rock 2

On the first day, when the young people arrived, they had icebreaking, games and talent-night. These activities were intended to build relationships among the participants. The talent-night, emceed by Bro Brendan was fun-filled and signaled that greater things were about to come.

The Praise & Worship led by Melvin D’Silva began to touch the young participants as they felt a sense of God’s presence. He also introduced the theme song of the camp, which was the WYD 2008 song, ‘Receive the Power’. At the Opening Mass, Deacon Adrian gave a simple explanation of the readings taken from John 3 and Romans 5, and shared his personal testimony of how he experienced God’s love and reality in his life. One participant shared, ‘I learned that we were not friends of God but we became friends because He gave us His Son’. The day ended beautifully with prayers to the Divine Mercy.

The second day began with ‘Uncle Bob’ sharing on the salvation that Christ offered to us. Through his personal and straight-forward sharings, he captured the hearts of the youth and encouraged them to seek for Jesus. Next was Martinian Lee who in his session on ‘New life’, focused on God’s plan for sexuality and family life. Deacon Adrian explained the connection between Salvation and New Life: that salvation was more than just being forgiven; it also meant living righteously as sons and daughters of God.

Martinian also played the DVD segment from the Theology of the Body on ‘Hope and Redemption’ as a preparation for Confession. One young person got the message: ‘When you go for confession tell all your sins; don’t cheat’. Having been cleansed spiritually, they were ready for Inner Healing led by Bob at night. ‘I really felt the presence of God. A great weight was lifted off especially at the forgiveness part. Awesome!’, another participant shared.

In the tradition set by the previous Youth Rock, the young people started the third day with a visit to the Graceville Retirement Home. There, they helped to clean and decorated the home for Christmas. Next, Adrian Matthews gave a recap thus far and explained further on the gifts of the Holy Spirit, focusing on the more common ones.

This was followed with Francisco Overee delivering his talk on ‘Baptised in the Spirit’. Some participants were surprised to learn that this Malaccan boy was only 18 years old; ‘God can work through you even when you are young’, one participant said in amazement. Although he was humourous, more importantly, he demonstrated a confidence beyond his age in leading the praying over session. Many felt- as one youth put it- that ‘The session was awe-inspiring, life-changing and very precious’.

At night, the young people prayed a chaplet of the Rosary; as each bead was recited, a tea light candle was lit to mark the prayer. Later, they watched ‘Facing the Giants’. It was an inspiring spiritual movie that communicated the message that there is nothing impossible to God.

On the last day, the talks on ‘Growth’ and ‘Transformation’ were presented by Edward Soh/Mark Anthony and Bro Brendan. The culmination of this awesome camp was a Mass with Fr Moses Rayappan who reminded the young people, at the beginning of Advent to have a spirit of gratitude and contentment. As the young people left the camp, Mark soberly reminded them all that they had to live the message that they have received at the camp if they are going to have another ‘Youth Rock’.