Activate II: Mercy

Sep 10, 2016

By Joyce Chan
Running for its ninth consecutive year, the annual Youth Rally organized by ChristTeens (a ministry for teenagers in the Diocese of Miri) saw more than 1600 teenagers from the Catholic church and from other churches, participate from July 6-8, 2016. This number also includes some 400 participants from Limbang, Marudi, Belaga, Lapok and Bintulu.

This year, the Rally was themed Activate II: Mercy — a continuation of the Activate themed Rally series, and is in conjunction with this year’s Jubilee Year of Mercy. Before the Youth Rally began, a Mercy Cross (signifying the Mercy of God) began travelling through several towns from Divine Mercy Sunday, April 2016, starting from Miri, to Bintulu, to Sebauh, to Tatau and to Sungai Asap.

The Mercy Cross then made a special trip back for the Youth Rally in Miri — and was brought into the Rally as part of the grand opening. The Mercy Cross continued to be present throughout the Rally as the symbol of God’s mercy present to all the participants.

The talks were given by the Diocese’s own Priests — Fr Andy Lee, Fr John Chia and Fr Sylvester — also centred around the topic of God’s Mercy, which exposed the participants to the meaning of the Year of Mercy, what Mercy is about, what the Bible says about Mercy and where the source of Mercy comes from.

The talks then shifted focus to how the participants themselves need to grow personally to be more merciful, how they should practise Mercy in their daily lives and how they should all be missionaries of Mercy to the world, as part of their life-long identity as Christians. Being uniquely gifted and talented, each priest presented his talk with different accompaniments through music, skits, life examples and videos.

During the last talk, Fr Andy also took the opportunity to call out the different professions and asked the participants to stand up if it was their ambition to be teachers, policemen, doctors, nurses, pharmacists, priests, consecrated life, engineers, bankers, businessmen, accountants etc. and prayed for them that they would all practise mercy in their different professions in the future.

The Rally also included an Altar Call — where hundreds of participants came forward to be prayed over by the priests, as a sign of their decision and desire to do what He wills. There was also a Healing Service where all the participants had the opportunity to experience Jesus’ healing presence, both physically and spiritually. On the last day, all three priests prayed over the participants to be anointed with the gifts of the Holy Spirit during the Immersion service.

During his Opening Mass homily, Rt. Rev. Bishop Richard Ng explained to the participants that “Mercy means we don’t deserve it. If we deserve it, this is called ‘merit’. We don’t deserve to be forgiven, but yet God still forgives us — and this is what the Mercy of God is about.” Just like the murderer who killed St. Maria Goretti, although we can’t see the outcome of evil i.e. the killing and raping of an innocent girl, but somehow through God’s Mercy, good can be brought out of evil — as seen from the change of heart of the murderer later on. Bishop Ng then reminded the participants that they were attending the Rally to learn about Mercy. Mercy is not something that can be switched on at the click of a button, but has to grow through daily decisions, practice, conquering bad habits and repentance.

His message was built on by Fr Sylvester in his homily on the second day where he reminded the participants that “You were given without charge, so give without charge.” As we can never repay Jesus for His death on the cross for us, we, too, need to give to others freely by saying “yes” to God everyday.

In his closing Mass homily, Fr Andy ended the Rally with the message that they are all called to be like the light of the candle — as it burns, it sacrifices itself for the sake of giving light to others. He prayed that the same Jesus whom the participants experienced during the Rally would go wherever they go, and the light of the Son would continue shining brightly through them until the end — and that the participants would remain steadfast and merciful just as God is steadfast and merciful to us.

The Mercy Cross was then handed over by Fr John Chia (representing Sungai Asap, Belaga) to Fr Joseph Ding (representing Long San, Baram) as it continues on its journey throughout the Diocese of Miri for the rest of the Jubilee Year of Mercy. The Rally officially ended with a Concert on the last night — where the participants had the chance to freely praise God through Christian Music, led by the Miri Young Catholic Students (MYCS) and the Young Apostles (YA).

This concert also included performances by the three musically talented priests who sang beautifully, to the amazement of the young audiences.

During the Rally, all participants signed pledge cards and promised to practise what they learnt from the Rally and to be merciful to others after the Rally. Ever since the Rally, a “Mercy challenge” is posted weekly on the Youth Rally Facebook page — where participants are given a different act of Mercy to carry out every week. Some participants eagerly respond that they are waiting for the next challenge to be posted.