VANCOUVER—The bishop of Calgary, a professional football player, and 670 young adults rang in 2015 with a national conference and a New Year’s bash.
The annual event, Rise Up, was put on by Catholic Christian Outreach (CCO) to inspire Catholics aged 18-35. This year it was held in Calgary.
“To see 600-plus university students acting their faith is very inspirational and very uplifting,” said Saskatchewan Roughrider John Chick.
The conference included Mass, talks, praise and worship, opportunities for confession, and a New Year’s banquet and dance, Dec. 28 – Jan. 1. Other well-known speakers included Auxiliary Bishop Christian Riesbeck of Ottawa, CC; Catholic apologist Matt Fradd; and counsellor Jake Khym from Abbotsford.
Bishop Riesbeck called the participants “radically alive, zealous young adults.” The first Rise Up he attended was in 2013 in Ottawa, before his ordination as a bishop.
Amber Zolc, CCO campus leader at UBC, called the conference “an encouraging time for these young people to gather and recognize they are part of something bigger than themselves.”
The relationships they form “are what sustain them as they go forth in their everyday lives and as joyful witnesses of the Gospel.”
Christ the King seminarian Olivier Coutant was particularly moved by Khym’s presentation and time for reflection on New Year’s Eve.
“It struck me during Jake’s talk that there are real situations in my life where I need to live more as a son than as an orphan. I’ll say with confidence that there’s so much beauty and freedom in living as God’s son and not as an orphan.”
Travis Van Vliet, a participant who is a member of St. Joseph’s Parish in Langley, arrived in Calgary after taking a bus provided by CCO. It was his first time attending the conference.
“I made connections with other Catholic young adults. That is something that is not easy to come across nowadays. There truly is something special about 700 young adults in one room worshipping God!”
The event ran under the theme “Revive This Generation.” Coutant suggested it echoed Pope Francis’s plea that World Youth Day 2013 participants make a “big mess” in their homes and churches.
“I think Rise Up should inspire us young people to do the same and to return to our dioceses equipped and inspired to ‘revive this generation,'” he said.
Maria Wynker from St. Mary’s Parish in Chilliwack signed up to attend Rise Up when she felt her soul needed a spiritual boost.
“I had been growing bored and distant in my faith for the past year or so. I realized that my soul was craving that classic ‘spiritual high’ that one often gets after retreats and such. I also needed to go to confession, badly.”
Rise Up did more than satisfy that craving. “Not only was the event fun while I was there, but I walked away from it knowing that there are hundreds more like me out there who are also evangelizing the truth to a desperate and confused world.”
After the countdown to midnight, the energetic crowd paused the dance music to sing a worship song.
“The opening moments of the dawn of the new year are spent in prayer,” Zolc said. She suggested a New Year’s resolution during her closing talk the next day: daily prayer.
“It’s that overflow with that encounter with Christ that allows us to share that love with others and bring revival to our generation,” she said.
CCO was founded in 1988 to provide spiritual support to university students. The organization holds Rise Up in a different city each year, alternating between east and west. The next conference will be held in Montreal.
