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Following a visit to Sydney by Bishop Peter Stasiuk in 1997, it was decided at a meeting of parishioners to revive our youth. Mr Steven Cimbaly was elected as the Leader and was asked to look at ways of gathering our youth. It took a while to get the young people together and although there were a number of monthly meetings not all the young people were able to come together because of their study and work commitments.
In 1999, the annual gathering of Youth For Christ was to be held in Sydney and this saw a resurgence of interest generated by a small core group of regular worshippers. This young group managed to organise themselves into a strong organisation similar to the one initiated by Fr Ivan Szewciw in the 70's (YKT-Ukrainian Catholic Youth). In fact they hosted the YFC Gathering by themselves only drawing upon the knowledge and experience of their parents in areas they were not too sure or unfamiliar to them.
Sydney Parish Youth have acquired a room on the church grounds which they freshened up with a new coat of paint and some furniture to make it their own. It is their vision that this room will be used not only for their meetings but, also as a place where young people can drop in and feel that they belong to our parish. Anyone who is young at heart is welcome to visit the young people in the room, which is presently open on Sundays from 9.00am -12.00pm. Monthly meetings take place on the second Sunday of each month.
My personal thanks goes to all the young people who made this possible and especially to Fr Zenon, our parish priest, who kindly donated the room to his young parishioners.
In the future, it is envisioned that our Group will hold BBQ's, picnics, Harbour Cruises, Bowling nights and so on…We will also grabbing any chance to make young people aware of their Ukrainian rite, heritage as well as guiding them in prayer and taking them away on retreats.
