St. Patrick Youth Ministry

09/23/2024

St. Hildegard of Bingen was born in the year 1098. She was the last of ten children, and at a young age her parents entrusted her to the care of an anchoress, Jutta of Sponheim. While living with Jutta near the Benedictine monastery of Disibodenberg, Hildegard learned to read and write in Latin, she learned how to chant the psalms, and she likely learned the basics of how to play music. Other women began to join Jutta and Hildegard, and their community gradually developed into a monastery of Benedictine nuns. After Jutta died in 1136, Hildegard was elected the next superior of the community. She would lead her fellow nuns as the abbess until her death at the age of 81 in 1179. Under her leadership, the community of nuns kept growing to the point where they moved to a larger location in Rupertsberg in 1150, and then later split off in 1165, forming a second monastery across the river in Eibingen.

From a young age, St. Hildegard experienced visions where she learned the deep mysteries of God and saw all things in His light. She rarely spoke of these visions until she was 42 when God instructed her to write down all that she saw and heard. Over the next four decades of her life, she wrote three large works of her visionary theology. The most well-known of these works is titled Scivias, short for "Know the Ways of the Lord." St. Hildegard also corresponded with many people of her day, including popes, emperors, abbots, abbesses, and fellow saints (e.g., St. Bernard of Clairvaux). Nearly 400 of her letters survive today!

In recent decades, St. Hildegard has gained a lot of popularity due to the music she composed for her nuns. She wrote 77 liturgical chants as well as a morality play featuring the virtues. In fact, more musical works can be definitely attributed to St. Hildegard than any other Medieval composer! Her music shows the influences of both Benedictine and Cistercian chant, but also displays her own style and creativity. Because many have recently taken an interest in her music, recordings of her chants can easily be found online.

St. Hildegard of Bingen, pray for us!

09/14/2024

Here's just a few more highlights from our high school and junior high kickoff nights. Many thanks to the volunteers who made it all happen!

09/14/2024

The junior high youth group also kicked off last week. Here are some of the highlights!

09/13/2024

The year has begun! Here are some photos from our high school youth group kickoff night.

05/15/2024

This is the beauty of Our Church!

Our Lady of Fatima, pray for us now and at the hour of our death; Amen!

05/13/2024

St. Florian was born around AD 250 in ancient Rome where over the course of his life joined the Roman army and advanced through the ranks. He eventually rose to the status of a commander where he organized and trained an elite group of soldiers whose sole duty was to fight fires. During the Diocletianic Persecution of Christians, reports reached Rome that Florain was not enforcing the proscriptions against Christians in his territory. As a result of an investigation, St. Florian was ordered to sacrifice to the Roman gods, but he refused. It is said that after he made a bold confession of the faith he was twice scourged, half-flayed alive, set on fire, and then ultimately drowned in the Enns river after being thrown in with a stone around his neck.

St. Florian lived his life with great patriotism and prudence, but not at the expense of his faith. He models for us a holy diligence in giving of ourselves with excellence to our work, and he teaches us that all that we do, and all that we testify to, must ultimately have its foundation in Christ. May we also live with the same diligence and conviction in the conduct of our own lives. St. Florian, pray for us!

05/11/2024

St. Bernadette Soubirous was the firstborn child to an extremely poor family from Lourdes, southern France. She was 14 years old when the Blessed Mother first appeared to her in a nearby grotto above the banks of the Gave River. While seen as a virtuous girl, she was not a bright student, and throughout the 18 appearances that the Blessed Mother made to St. Bernadette, many were skeptical of the reports of her visions and encounters with Our Lady.

In addition to the suffering St. Bernadette endured on account of skeptical townspeople and civil authorities, she also was of poor health for the majority of her life, suffering from asthma from an early age. She was a model of heroic fortitude and perseverance, faithfully defending the genuineness of her visions and faithfully transmitting Our Lady's messages. It is through St. Bernadette's faithfulness that we received from our Blessed Mother her identity as the Immaculate Conception. By this same faithfulness, many pilgrims have experienced healing by visiting the chapel and grotto in Lourdes, following as Mary instructed St. Bernadette to "drink from the spring and wash herself there." May St. Bernadette teach us to live with the same faithfulness that she did throughout her life! St. Bernadette, pray for us!

05/04/2024

Throwback to Ask a Friar night!

02/19/2024

DTS Throwback! Presenting St. Juliana of Nicomedia! Who is she?

As one of many young people ordered to be killed by Emperor Diocletian in the last great persecution before the legalization of Christianity, St. Juliana lived and died in fidelity to her faith and love of God. After converting to Christianity, her pagan father was furious - at his hand she suffered much torture and scourging, out of his contempt for her faith and chastity. Against her will, he betrothed her to a Roman prefect who, in similar measure, despised Juliana for her Christian faith. Once he realized that she was not going to become his wife, he decided if he couldn't have her no one could, and had her thrown in jail. While in jail, it is said that she was seen fighting with a disguised Satan - whom she overcame victoriously, binding him and throwing him to the ground. Atta girl! In the end, after failed attempts at her ex*****on by burning flames and boiling oil, she was finally beheaded.

While it is extremely unlikely that we will face boiling oil, burning by flames, or beheading - St. Juliana can be for us a model of wholehearted love for God and faithfulness to Him amid the most extreme and difficult of circumstances. She teaches us how to stand courageously in the face of trials and to persevere with fortitude against false values and lies disguised as goods that society tries to convince us of. May St. Juliana of Nicomedia teach us to hold fast to our faith and convictions with a love and fidelity that brings about godly perseverance and spiritual fortitude. St. Juliana, pray for us!

02/13/2024

Remember!

Tomorrow is Ash Wednesday and the beginning of the Lenten season. Our Masses will be at 7:00am (no music or incense), 11:45am (no music or incense), and 6:30pm (music and incense). Ashes will be distributed at all Masses. Confessions will be heard immediately after the 11:45am Mass, as usual. Ash Wednesday is a day of fasting for all Catholics ages 18-59, and a day of abstinence from meat for Catholics 14 years old and up.

02/07/2024

Yesterday for youth group, we played an intense round of paper football! We congratulate Jude for his Super Bowl win! 🥇🎉🥳