Queen of Heaven
Youth (13-18) and Young Adult Ministry (21+)
We are committed to providing opportunities to grow closer to Christ and to one another through fun events that bring young Christians together, we strengthen each other in faith, hope, and love David Gernatt, took a group of young adults to Arizona to check out an up and coming type of youth ministry - Life Teen. Thrilled by the ministry they saw, they brought Life Teen back with them. Catherine's Life Teen ran a beautiful 18 years until the closing of St. Catherine's closing, our Life Teen group was welcomed into Queen of Heaven Parish, also in West Seneca, by its Pastor and Parochial Vicar - at the time - Fr. Tom Quinlivan and Fr. Most currently, we continue to flourish under the guidance of our current Pastor, Fr. Greg Faulhaber, and Parochial Vicar, Fr. Denning Achidi
What's with the name? In the times of the early Roman Christians, followers of Christ were often persecuted for their faith and any outward symbol of it. They were forced to go “underground”. As a means of identifying one another and safe gathering places, the use of this fish symbol , the ichthus, came to be. The fish is linked with the miracle of the loaves and fishes and of Jesus’ desire for the disciples to become fishers of men. The Greek translation of the word is Jesus, Christ, Son of God, Savior. When St. Catherine's was closing, the fate of our Life Teen was uncertain. We adopted this symbol as our “mascot” of sorts. It helped us in the realization that God would provide a way, even if we had to go “underground”. In our move to Queen of Heaven, we wanted to establish a new identity. One where old friends felt comfortable and new friends felt welcomed. After much prayerful consideration, we gave our newly merged Life Teen the name of Ichthus Life Teen to celebrate where we’ve come from, where we are and the great future we were hopeful for.
