Youth, Family and Faith - Preparing for Congress

Janet Forbes
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This podcast series has been created to support delegates preparing for the Congress on Youth, Family & Faith in the Archdiocese of Armagh. Each episode explores one of the key priorities that emerged from listening across parishes and communities, helping us reflect together on where the Holy Spirit may be calling the Church at this time. The reflections follow the same material contained in the preparatory document shared with delegates, offering an alternative way to engage with the content while travelling, walking, or taking time for personal reflection. As you listen, you are invited to pray, reflect, and consider how these priorities might shape concrete action and renewed mission in our parishes, families, schools, and communities. Together, we prepare to listen, discern, and walk forward in hope.

Episodes

  1. An Overarching Priority - The Challenges of Modern Life

    FEB 1

    An Overarching Priority - The Challenges of Modern Life

    In this episode, we reflect on the priority The Challenges of Modern Life, drawing on the experiences shared across the Archdiocese during our listening process. This Priority impact all of the previous six priorities and is a common thread and challenge that runs through each.  Many spoke of the pressures facing young people and families today — anxiety, busyness, mental health struggles, loss of trust, and the weight of expectations in a fast-changing world. This episode invites delegates to consider how the Church can respond with compassion, realism, and hope, accompanying people where they truly are and offering faith as a source of resilience and meaning. Grounded in Scripture and recent Church teaching, the reflection highlights a Church called not to stand apart from these realities but to walk alongside those experiencing them, listening deeply and responding with mercy rather than judgment. The episode also presents practical proposals emerging from parish and school feedback, including supports for mental health, safe spaces for young people, responses to family pressures, and renewed attention to belonging, trust, and pastoral care. Listeners are invited to reflect prayerfully on how the Church can walk more closely with people amid the real challenges of contemporary life.

    5 min
  2. Priority 6: Prayer and Spirituality

    FEB 1

    Priority 6: Prayer and Spirituality

    In this episode, we reflect on the priority of Prayer and Spirituality, recognising prayer as the lifeblood of a synodal Church  the place where we listen for God’s voice, deepen our relationship with Christ, and find strength for mission. Listening across the Archdiocese revealed both a deep hunger for prayer and the struggle many experience in finding time and space for reflection in an increasingly busy and distracted culture. This episode invites delegates to consider how prayer and spirituality can be renewed and supported in homes, schools, and parish communities. Drawing on Scripture and Church teaching, the reflection highlights how prayer sustains our baptismal identity as beloved children of God and keeps faith alive and active in everyday life. It also explores the Church’s call to cultivate spaces of encounter where people, especially young people and families, can experience prayer as life-giving and hope-filled. The episode presents practical proposals emerging from parish and school feedback, including supporting family prayer, developing retreats and pilgrimages, creating quiet and reflective spaces, and offering accessible opportunities for communal and personal prayer. Listeners are invited to reflect prayerfully on how prayer and spirituality can be nurtured to sustain faith, belonging, and mission in the life of the Church today.

    4 min
  3. Priority 5. Faith Formation and Catechesis

    FEB 1

    Priority 5. Faith Formation and Catechesis

    In this episode, we reflect on the priority of Faith Formation and Catechesis, responding to a widespread desire across the Archdiocese for formation that goes deeper — helping people understand not only what the Church teaches, but why faith matters in everyday life. This priority focuses on forming people of all ages as missionary disciples, nurturing a living relationship with Jesus that shapes daily choices, relationships, and witness in the world. Rooted in Scripture and Church teaching, the episode reminds us that baptism begins a lifelong journey of learning, following, and sharing faith, a responsibility entrusted to the whole People of God. Drawing directly from parish and school listening, the episode presents practical proposals and pastoral pathways to support faith development in families, schools, and parish communities. These include renewed sacramental preparation, post-sacramental support, youth faith initiatives, scripture study, mentoring, creative approaches to formation, and programmes that help young people engage with contemporary questions about faith and life. Listeners are invited to reflect prayerfully on how formation and catechesis can help people grow in confident, joyful faith and active participation in the life and mission of the Church.

    6 min
  4. Priority 4: The Ecosystem of Faith, School, Parish and Family

    FEB 1

    Priority 4: The Ecosystem of Faith, School, Parish and Family

    In this episode, we reflect on the priority of the Ecosystem of Faith — the shared responsibility of family, school, and parish in handing on faith to the next generation. Listening across the Archdiocese repeatedly affirmed that faith is not formed in one place alone. It grows through relationships in the home, is supported in schools, and is celebrated and sustained in parish communities. This episode invites delegates to consider how stronger collaboration between these settings can better support families and young people, ensuring that schools are not carrying faith formation alone and that parishes become welcoming hubs of connection and shared mission. Drawing on Scripture and Church teaching, the reflection highlights the family as the first place of faith, the important partnership role of Catholic schools, and the parish as the spiritual home that gathers and supports the wider community. It also recognises the need to support parents, teachers, clergy, and pastoral workers so they can accompany young people with confidence and hope. The episode presents practical proposals emerging from parish and school feedback, including joint parish–school–family initiatives, stronger sacramental collaboration, family-centred parish activities, youth programmes, and renewed efforts to ensure faith is lived and supported across all areas of community life. Listeners are invited to reflect prayerfully on how families, schools, and parishes can walk together more intentionally in forming young people and strengthening faith for the future.

    6 min
  5. Priority 3: Liturgy and Participation

    FEB 1

    Priority 3: Liturgy and Participation

    In this episode, we reflect on the priority of Liturgy and Participation, responding to a clear desire expressed across the Archdiocese for worship that is prayerful, meaningful, and genuinely participatory, especially for young people and families. This reflection highlights that the question is not simply about style, but about baptismal dignity and shared responsibility in the Church’s worship. Liturgy is the place where the whole community encounters Christ, listens to the Word, celebrates faith together, and is sent out in mission. Drawing on Scripture and Church teaching, the episode explores how authentic participation in liturgy forms communities for communion, discernment, and missionary discipleship. It emphasises the importance of inclusion, sensitivity, and creating spaces where families and young people can recognise themselves as active participants rather than observers. The episode also presents practical proposals emerging from parish and school feedback, including strengthening youth involvement, developing music and liturgical ministries, improving parish–school collaboration, supporting lay leadership, and helping communities grow in deeper understanding and participation in the liturgy. Listeners are invited to reflect prayerfully on how worship can become a place of encounter, belonging, and missionary sending for the whole community.

    8 min
  6. Priority 2: Belonging

    FEB 1

    Priority 2: Belonging

    In this episode, we reflect on the priority of Belonging, recognising that at the heart of the Gospel is the experience of being known, welcomed, and valued within a community of faith. Listening across the Archdiocese revealed a deep desire for the Church to be experienced not simply as a place people attend, but as a community where they truly feel at home. This episode invites delegates to consider how parishes and schools can become spaces of genuine welcome, relationship, and trust, especially for young people, families, and those who may feel on the margins. Drawing on Scripture and Church teaching, the reflection explores how belonging flows from baptismal dignity, calling every person into shared life and responsibility within the Church. It highlights the importance of listening, accompaniment, and inclusion, ensuring people experience the Church as close, understanding, and supportive in the real circumstances of their lives. The episode also presents practical proposals emerging from parish and school feedback, including ministries of welcome, listening spaces, outreach initiatives, social gatherings, youth-led activities, and new ways of building relationships within parish communities. Listeners are invited to reflect prayerfully on how a culture of welcome and encounter can grow so that every person experiences the Church as a place where they truly belong.

    6 min
  7. Priority 1. Digital Evangelisation and Communication

    FEB 1

    Priority 1. Digital Evangelisation and Communication

    In this episode, we explore the priority of Digital Communication and Evangelisation — one of the key themes emerging from listening across parishes, schools, families, and young people throughout the Archdiocese. Participants consistently highlighted that much of life, especially for young people, now unfolds online. Digital spaces are places where identity, belonging, and searching are shaped. This reflection invites delegates to consider how the Church can meet people in these spaces with authenticity and hope, ensuring that digital engagement becomes a pathway to real encounter, community, and faith. Rooted in Scripture and Church teaching, the episode reflects on how mission today necessarily includes the digital world, while also acknowledging concerns about digital overload and the impact of constant connectivity on family life, wellbeing, and prayer. Drawing directly from parish and school submissions, the episode presents concrete proposals and pastoral pathways for strengthening digital presence, empowering young people as digital witnesses, supporting families in finding balance, and building a more connected and missionary Church.

    7 min
  8. Diocesan Congress - An introduction to the Priorities and Reflection

    FEB 1

    Diocesan Congress - An introduction to the Priorities and Reflection

    This opening episode introduces the preparatory journey for delegates attending the Diocesan Congress on Youth, Family & Faith. Drawing on eight months of listening and consultation across parishes, schools, families, and youth communities, seven key priorities have emerged to guide the future life and mission of the Church in the Archdiocese of Armagh. In this episode, delegates are invited to reflect on their role in prayerful discernment as preparations continue for the February gatherings and the Diocesan Congress. The episode explains how the series will unfold, with each subsequent reflection exploring one priority, outlining proposed actions and pastoral pathways, and offering a Faith and Mission lens rooted in Scripture and Church teaching.

    3 min
  • 8 Episodes

About

This podcast series has been created to support delegates preparing for the Congress on Youth, Family & Faith in the Archdiocese of Armagh. Each episode explores one of the key priorities that emerged from listening across parishes and communities, helping us reflect together on where the Holy Spirit may be calling the Church at this time. The reflections follow the same material contained in the preparatory document shared with delegates, offering an alternative way to engage with the content while travelling, walking, or taking time for personal reflection. As you listen, you are invited to pray, reflect, and consider how these priorities might shape concrete action and renewed mission in our parishes, families, schools, and communities. Together, we prepare to listen, discern, and walk forward in hope.

Information

  • Creator
    Janet Forbes
  • Years Active
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  • Episodes
    8
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    Clean
  • Copyright
    © 2026 Youth, Family and Faith - Preparing for Congress