Right: L-R: Maddi Cross, Caitlin Seng, Zoe Woodall and Bethany Lentern - participants from Rockhampton Diocese at AYCS conference
held in Brisbane in January 2010

Day One
After a slightly bumpy landing Caitlin, Maddi, Zoe and I arrived at Brisbane airport where we joined a group or students and adults from Canberra/Goulburn, Parramatta and Melbourne Dioceses. We moved on to St James College where we took part in a forum about racism in Australia. It was incredible to see about 80 students gather from around Australia for the conference. AYCS has made a pledge about anti-racism and it is to be sent to schools all across the country! We then moved venues to the Outlook at Boonah - it’s BEAUTIFUL! We had a relaxing evening, house rules, welcome and reflection. Time for some shut eye...

Day Two
Today started with an awesome action story and reflection from the Port Pirie group, and passing our first vote for our standing orders. As observers, our diocese doesn’t have a vote, but all the same it’s great to watch it all unfold. We’ve also covered the areas of the movement, our 2020 and 2010 goals. It’s a bit overwhelming but our small groups help to break things open. We got to see presentations from all the different dioceses about the reality of their situations and what YCS is doing in their areas. Tonight we voted on who the next National Workers will be – Congrats to Merida Cook, Vicky Burrows and Elise Gangly!

Day Three
Parramatta hosted today’s action story and reflections. Then the National Executive Members started taking us through sessions about the Three Truths, the Review of Life, and different leadership skill workshops. My head is positively reeling! Everyone looked ready for bed at 6pm... Tonight’s dinner was intense. We had a Poverty Meal. I was sitting on a cement floor, eating plain rice (with my hands), watching 25 people at a table eat rice and a plain sauce with only a fork, and 10 people eating rice with a meat sauce, bread rolls, drinking coke and even having flowers to decorate their table! I don’t think anyone ate much tonight... when you realise that you’re someone who normally sits at that fancy table looking down on everyone else you tend to lose your appetite. Our diocesan group tonight was really good, I’m looking forward to tomorrow. Off to evening reflection and then to bed.

Day Four
The students from Perth ran the morning Action Story and Reflection, it was awesome! We learnt about the relationship YCS has with Young Christian Workers. Our diocese is really excited to try and set up links with any YCW groups that start up in our diocese. This afternoon was our afternoon off. Tonight was formal night, it was incredible! Everyone got dressed up and the adults served all the students. After dinner we had a dance party before we went to Diocesan Groups to review the day and to Perth’s night time reflection.

Day Five
After yesterday’s break I woke up feeling fantastic and really excited to see what Canberra/Goulburn would do for their Action Story and Reflection. Today we learnt more about the history of the YCS and Joseph Cardijn (the founder of YCS), and the YCS movement in Fiji. Although I’ve been involved in YCS for four years now, I still got so much out of both of these sessions. Definitely a highlight of my week. This afternoon was a bit more stressful with voting taking place on three of our action plan areas: Relationship with God, Mission and Leadership Skills. We got there though and the final decisions were awesome. After all this we went into our small groups for our second personal review of life. This was a looonnnngggg day but it was great to finish up with our diocese gathering and then going to night time reflection together.

Day Six
I cannot believe it’s day six already! Melbourne is hosting the Action Story and Reflections today. The main focus today was what the Faith in Action Area would be... this went majorly overtime as everyone really struggled to work out what was best for the National Movement. Eventually a decision was reached and over the next two years AYCS will use “100% Respect” as their national campaign with a sub-campaign of Fairtrade. In the afternoon we looked at Personal Membership Contributions, had a FANTASTIC quiz after dinner (my team came second-good job!), had our diocesan time, and our reflection. Tonight’s reflection was incredible, a really moving experience where everyone had the opportunity to affirm those around them. Tomorrow will be a busy day-definitely time for me to go to sleep.

Day Seven
It’s our second last day of the conference and our final Action Story and Reflection-Townsville did an awesome job of it. Today has been crazy! We started off with learning about financial sustainability; more planning and voting on 2012 aims for Recruitment, Adult Assistants and Chaplains, Promotion and International YCS; using YCS resources; and how to put the conference into action. This evening we celebrated Mass and it was amazing! I felt so moved and so empowered tonight. After dinner we had our talent night where lots of people got up and had a go. I cannot believe how many people had such incredible levels of talent! After a fantastic last Diocesan Group Review, we experienced a really moving meditation reflection before trying to get some packing underway and heading to bed.

Day Eight
Today was a pack up, clean up and gather for our final address and say our farewells before we headed back to Brisbane. We made it back in good time. The Dioceses of Rockhampton and Port Pirie hit Queen Street Mall for some lunch and a quick shop before our shuttle bus left for the airport. Saying goodbye was really tough. There were so many people to say goodbye to, so many places to plan to visit and so many tears as we all realised how close a family we had become over the past week. The whole week was incredible, I’m definitely looking forward to sleeping in my own bed, but I will greatly miss seeing so many students take action to bring about a better world. Caitlin, Zoe and Maddi made my week an awesome one-thanks girls! I can’t wait to see YCS up and running in the Diocese of Rockhampton.

Bethany Lentern
Co-ordinator - Diocesan Youth Ministries