Home | Magazine | Archives | Directory | Events | Testimonies | Prayerline | Links | Contact Us | Subscribe

... From the Goodnews archives, March/April 2004

David Palmer, one of the Catholic Evangelisation Services team, explains their latest initiative to produce a video series for young people

Over the last five years Catholic Evangelisation Services has produced eight video series on different aspects of Catholic teaching. At the suggestion of Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor we put our resources together to form CaFE - Catholic Faith Exploration- a flexible process for parish use. We were delighted to find that since its launch in 2002, CaFE has been welcomed in many dioceses in this country and in other English speaking countries round the world, particularly Australia. However, wherever we go, people ask us when we will be producing resources for young people. At first the team was reluctant to get involved as they felt that this would be very different from their usual work. But last summer we ran several small pilot schemes with various youth groups (in parishes and schools) and we realised that what spoke to young people was shorter and more technically sophisticated video material done in the MTV style that teenagers are used to. After consultation with youth workers and after much prayer we have begun to work on a series for 13-16 year olds, roughly based on the very popular "Knowing God Better" series of talks but presented in a more culturally relevant way for teens. The aim of the series is to help young people get a deeper understanding of their faith and how it can help them in their everyday lives. It will include a clear explanation of the Gospel message and how the Church and the Sacraments are relevant to them. The short video talks will be complemented by icebreakers, activities, prayer and response times to help build a sense of identity and community. Making this kind of video, however, is much more costly than simply filming talking heads. Just to produce and edit the series will cost about £75,000 and a further £30,000 is required to market it and employ a youth worker to help implementation. A three minute trailer, entitled "Life to the Full", giving an idea of the content and style of the series has already been produced. The reaction to this has been very positive and some youth teams have already been using the trailer itself as a way of proclaiming the need for an understanding of the love of God. A short fund-raising video featuring this trailer has been made and this is being sent out to Trusts, parishes and individuals to raise funds to enable the next stage of the project to go ahead. We are appealing to anyone who has been blessed by our CaFE resources or who has a concern to reach young people, to help us raise the money we need to complete the project. If you feel that you might be able to organise a fund raising event in your parish or have any contact with any grant-making bodies or individuals who may be interested in sponsoring this work please contact Catholic Evangelisation Services at the address below for more details Above all we would be very grateful for your prayer support for this project. For further details contact: Catholic Evangelisation Services, PO Box 333, St Albans, Herts, AL2 1EL tel/ fax 01727 829300 or web site www.faithcafe.org