The ‘Happening Youths’ Outreach Project

May 07, 2015

By Percy D’Cruz
Saving much from personal pocket money and allowances during the season of Lent, a group of 47 youths from St Francis Xavier, Holy Spirit and St Anne parishes, funded their marketing, cooking and preparation chores to churn out around 130 nutritious lunch boxes.

For the Tamil-speaking Youth Group, under the spiritual advisor Sr M Reetha of Banda Hilir’s Sacred Heart Canossian community, their effort is tagged as part of its outreach project.

Lunch boxes were handed out to inmates of the Prasanna Home for the Aged in Jalan Panjang, the Klebang Orphanage, the Malacca General Hospital and famished street people spotted around the back lanes of Banda Kaba, an area adjacent to the parish Church of St Francis Xavier.

According to Sr Reetha, this is the first time such a social outreach programme was undertaken as part of the Easter season.

There are plans for subsequent and similar outreaches to other old folks homes, children’s homes, as well as street people in the second half of this year, she noted.

Anne Dass, a spokesperson for the group, noted that the buzz phrase behind the whole outreach was ‘the happening.’ Explaining why this phrase came into being, she shared that it is the catch phrase today among young people.

She said, “The Happening’ in our case means that we are there in the midst. We are in the market place and understand the current trend of youths as we are more in touch with what is happening in society, and community, as well as local parish communities.”

These youths have been together as a group for some five years and the burning questions for them are whether “They really love the Church, and do they really love God?” and also “Can we not give back to God what He has given us?”

“We are young adults, either working or still learning at colleges. We want to be ‘the happening’ group in the local parishes and communities. Young people can do big things, and we always want to initiate plans or jointly help out in other projects developed by parishes,” said Anne Dass.