National Catholic Student Coalition (NCSC)
Update
In the past few months the National Catholic Student Coalition (NCSC) has been hard at work with many ongoing activities throughout the nation. Programming has been growing stronger this year. Over March 18-20, the NCSC hosted a Study Session at the United Nations (UN), involving speakers from the UN discussing millennium development goals, a tour of the UN, and visits to St. Patrick’s Cathedral and the Holy See mission. It was an intellectual and religious event that the NCSC hopes to continue in the future. College students from several different schools attended, including four executive board members.
International Forum
Also in March, three United States college students attended the International Youth Forum in Rome. Among these students was NCSC’s past national chair, Katie Pierce. The 2004 NCSC membership chair also attended as one of the International Movement of Catholic Students (IMCS) representatives. The forum, entitled “Youth and University: Witnessing to Christ in the University World,” gathered students from student movements, associations, and communities to discuss university life and ministry across the world.
NCSC Membership
With the school year is coming to a close, the NCSC would like to extend an invitation to the youth ministers of high school students to encourage their graduating seniors to become involved in the NCSC. As students are choosing what college they will be attending, it becomes apparent that they will be moving to various states across the nation. What better way to ensure that they stay involved in their faith than to provide them with membership to an organization like the NCSC? If you are interested in giving the gift of NCSC membership to your high school student, contact Ross Gruebel (ncsc_member@catholicstudent.org). This is a wonderful chance for high school seniors to graduate with the awareness that they have an organization supporting them in their student leadership and faith formation .
So What Does NCSC Do?
The National Catholic Student Coalition is an entirely student directed movement that invites, challenges, and empowers Catholic college students to take an active leadership role in their Catholic faith identity and share it on their campus community and church on a larger scale. We strive to provide every opportunity for dialog on issues that we as young adult Catholics face. Every year, the NCSC chooses a theme to center its programming and vision. The NCSC has been continually working on programming for this year’s theme; Ask Me How I Serve the Church! The NCSC provides students with resources such as our publication, The Catholic Collegian and our national website (www.catholicstudent.org).
We also hold an annual leadership conference which brings together students for workshops, networking, and prayer. We would like to extend an invitation to our national conference that will be taking place December 29, 2004 –January 2, 2005. The location of our conference has recently changed. It will be held in Washington , D.C. The NCSC is very excited and honored to be at our nation’s capital and we hope to see some of you there! More details on the conference will be coming out in the next few months.
Every year at our conference, each region raises change to participate in a penny challenge. We have titled this challenge for the second year in a row, “Pennies for Peace.” This year, the pennies will be raised for a Catholic student AIDS program in Africa. With support of the local church and the Jesuits, students from the national IMCS groups of 33 African countries created and launched the campaign, “African Youth Fighting against HIV/AIDS – No to Stigma! – Yes to Solidarity.” The main idea is to “train student trainers” from each country with the goal of them going back and training other students to organize events at the campus level. For more information on the program or how to help, please contact Carolyn Shierk at ncsc_program@catholicstudent.org.
As always the NCSC would like to thank you all for your continued prayers and support for our organization. If you have any questions or would like more information about any of our programs, please contact us at ncsc@catholicstudent.org or visit our website www.catholicstudent.org. We continue to look to this year that we may be instruments of Christ and catalysts for change. With prayers for peace in the world and many blessings for your ministries, God Bless You!
Email Connections at connections@nfcymoffice.org