This past Friday, the NET retreat team came over and held a faith retreat for the entire school day for the senior class. NET stands for National Evangelization team. The organization has several retreat teams that travel across the country to evangelize that bring young people closer to God.

My experience was powerful. I was surprised at how energetic the ministers were. I was also surprised even more on how young and numerous the retreat ministers were. There were over 20 ministers for the entire class. One of them, Isaac was only 18 years old! That’s the same age I am!

Several of the ministers gave testimonies on their lives to explain to us how to grow closer to God. Many of these stories had to do with finding your true self, and finding the everlasting joy that God brings.

The ministers also acted out dramas. These dramas were put into place to connect with our own struggles with sin and the real world. One of them talked about emotional and spiritual baggage that we carry with us in our lives, and explained how Jesus releases the baggage from our shoulders. They used actual backpacks to explain this point.

We also broke apart into small groups of eight people. In these small groups, we reflected on the talks given to us, and how we could each personally see their message in our lives, and how to apply it. Our own group leader guided us on how to enhance our faith with God. She also gave the opportunity for us to ask questions either about the NET retreat team itself, or personal questions about our faith.

In the second part of the retreat, we had a period of adoration and Mass. During adoration, we were able to sit quietly with God, read the Bible, pray with the ministers, and receive the Sacrament of Reconciliation. This time was crucial in order to make the decisions to finally let God into our lives more fully, and to apply the lessons the retreat team taught us.

Overall, the Senior Retreat was a blast! I am sad that as a senior, I will never be able to have this retreat again. I hope that the underclassmen had the same experience with their retreats as well, and I hope that you guys look forward to having retreats again next year!