Pope John Paul II Award
T.Y. Participants 2019-2020:Shóna Hurley, Aisling O’Reilly, Áine Moloney, Chloe Holland, Claire Murphy, Isobel Crowley, Méibh Collins and Sinéad Harte.
What is the Pope John Paul Award?:
Pope John Paul II Award Pope John Paul II Award
The Pope John Paul II Award was created to commemorate the late Pope John Paul II who was so committed to young people and who had such belief and confidence in them.The award involves getting young people involved in their parish and community. We are all participating in the Gold award, The award is non-competitive, flexible and voluntary and requires an ongoing commitment
Gold Award requirements
To achieve a Gold Award participants must complete the following:
Parish Involvement:1 hour per week x 20 weeks
Examples of activities in the parish that can be done for the Award are:
Reading at Mass
Altar Server
Eucharistic Minister
Member of choir/folk group
Church decoration
Collector
Composing prayers of the faithful
Preparing articles for the parish bulletin
Social Awareness:1 hour per week x 20 weeks
Examples of activities in the area of Social Awareness that you could do for your Award are:
Participation in St. Vincent de Paul projects
Faith and Light
Working in a youth club
Ongoing fundraising
Regular visitation of residential homes
Faith Friends
Top-Ups:6 hours
Award Top-Ups are given in recognition of the extra activities that young people are already involved in. Top-Ups will go towards the total number of hours an individual has to complete.
Top-Ups can be achieved in a number of ways, for example – helping with the sick pilgrims at Lourdes or working on behalf of Children in Crossfire.
Personal Reflection:
Preparing your personal reflection
When the participant completes the Parish Involvement and the Social Awareness sections of the Award he/she creates a personal reflection. This reflection may be written (approx 1500 words) or through an interview (interview conducted by the Award leader, recorded, then transcribed).
The reflection is to include:
An answer to the question – What does it mean to you to be a baptised member of the Church?
A personal reflection and evaluation on your parish involvement and social awareness work
Your reflection on how the teachings of Christ are relevant to your chosen activities
Conclusion
Through the personal reflection, the participant will show a knowledge and understanding of what they did within the context of the Church. Their role within the Church will become more apparent.
What Have we Been Doing?
We have also been actively involved in our school community. Back in September, we took part in the Opening of the School Year Mass. We each read a prayer of the faithful and we were blessed by the parish priest along with the Y.S.I. advocates, student council members and 6th year peer mentors.
We led the annual Carol Service on the last day of school before the Christmas break. All the John Paul candidates took part and some of the roles were lighting candles, readings and reflections. It was a lovely experience to lead the carol service with everyone involved.
Another activity we were involved in was distributing ashes on Ash Wednesday. We were responsible for collecting the ashes from Clonakilty Parish Church and distributing them to any staff or students interested in receiving them. Again it was nice to be included and great to assist the school community through the John Paul ll Award.
Submitted by Shona Hurley…Photographs to follow