By Ana Rodriguez Soto - Florida Catholic newspaper
Photographer: ANA RODRIGUEZ-SOTO | FC
Archbishop Thomas Wenski poses with the Our Lady of Lourdes confirmation team, winners of this year's Esperanza Ginoris award for excellence in catechesis, in recognition of their innovative Spirit Day retreat for teens.
MIAMI | Every year at Our Lady of Lourdes Parish in southwestern Miami-Dade County, more than 300 teenagers attend a Spirit Day retreat as part of their preparation for confirmation.
Retreat participants come from both the parish school and public and private schools in the neighborhood. The retreat concludes with a Mass attended by their parents.
This in itself is not unusual. What is unique to Our Lady of Lourdes is that the confirmation retreat itself is run by teenagers. About 70 of them take part each year as both peer team leaders and organizers.
“We get kids from our school, kids from Belen, kids from Columbus, both leading and participating,” said Tony Sierra, a member of the parish confirmation team. “We have kids that have been coming back for the past four years (to run it)—until they go to college.”
The teenagers meet every Monday night for two-and-a-half hours, from October to April, to plan the retreat. And the 16 catechists who make up the confirmation team devote an additional 30 to 60 hours each year to Spirit Day preparation.
The team at Our Lady of Lourdes has been doing this for about 12 years now, a record of dedication and innovation that earned them the 2014 Esperanza Ginoris Award for “persons or teams who best exemplify the standards of catechetical ministry excellence advocated by the Office of Catechesis in the Archdiocese of Miami.”
Peter Ductram, the office’s director, called their work “an outstanding example of live catechesis at work in the lives of many young people.”
Catechist and team member Mercy Yepez said they were surprised by the honor. “We were like, what did we do?”
Ana Rodriguez-Soto
