There is a place for you

By Fr Robert Christo

Vicar for Communications

“Father, does the Church really have a place for youth like me?” Perhaps you have never asked those words aloud, but you have felt them. Maybe you slipped quietly into the last pew, stood outside on the church steps, or left before anyone knew your name.

Perhaps you wondered whether the Church was only for “holier-than-thou people” while you were still trying to make sense of your life, your wounds and your questions.

If that is you, hear me clearly: we see you, we value you, and there is a place for you.

After many years of walking with young people, I have discovered something important. You are not searching for perfect adults. You are looking for authentic people who will listen before they lecture, accompany before they advise, and believe in you before you fully believe in yourself.

One teenager challenged me recently, “Father, leave Facebook. Come to TikTok where the real vibes are! Even rename your ministry D’ REAL WORD. We can read through fake. We want realness.”

I laughed, but he was right. Authenticity evangelises.

Pope Francis, in Christus Vivit, reminds us that young people need more than programmes. They need accompaniment. US Bishop Robert Barron often says that before the Church can convince the mind, she must capture the imagination with beauty, goodness, and authentic witness of young minds.

Jesus did exactly that. Before He corrected people, He connected with them. Before He preached, He encountered them. He met the Samaritan woman at the well where she was, not where she should have been (John 4).

As another young person once told me, “Father, relationship before religion.” There is deep wisdom there. Conversion begins with an encounter. Christ has a way of making our flaws… FLAWSOME. I have seen that truth come alive.

One Sunday I noticed a quiet boy standing at the back of the church. I invited him into ministry and simply kept walking with him. Today he leads our altar servers and is discerning the vocation of marriage. His journey began with one invitation: “Come. There is a place for you.”

One young woman changed the way I preach forever. After Mass I asked, “How was the homily?” She smiled and replied, “Father, you never even looked at me.”

I was stunned. “If you had made eye contact,” she continued, “I would have felt you were speaking to me.” She was right.

Young people first want to know that they matter. They want to be seen before they are instructed, heard before they are corrected, and loved before they are challenged. That is the rhythm of Jesus. Relationship leads to formation. Formation leads to discipleship.

Jesus often taught around a table. The early Christians gathered to break bread before they built institutions. The Church has always known that friendship is often the doorway to discipleship.

Today’s young people face challenges unlike any generation before them: artificial intelligence, social media, cyberbullying, pornography, anxiety, loneliness, fractured families, and constant comparison.

They do not simply need the Church to tell them what not to do. They need mentors who will show them how to do: to follow Christ in today’s world.

One young woman said it beautifully: “Father, the Church tells us what not to do, but nobody shows us how to do life with Jesus.”

She was not rejecting the Church. She was inviting us to become the Church more fully.

I have watched young people become extraordinary when they are trusted, challenged, and accompanied. Leaders emerge. Vocations blossom. Faith becomes personal. The Church stops being merely somewhere you attend and becomes the family where you belong.

So, bring your questions. Bring your gifts. Bring your doubts. Bring your dreams. There is room for you.

The Church is not waiting for some future, perfect version of you before she welcomes you. She needs your creativity, your compassion, your questions, and your courage today.

You were never created simply to fit into the crowd. You were created by the Father, redeemed by Christ, filled with the Holy Spirit, and sent on mission.

You are not only the future of the Church. You are an essential part of her mission now. There is a place for you. There always has been.