Confirmation

Confirmation preparation retreat
by: Katie mills

Walking into Trimble Hall, Zina and I were nervous. The room was quickly filled with anxious conversation as Casey O'Dell, Matthew Quick, Mama Quick, Glori Thompson, Alex Spiros, and Skylar Ramsey wandered in. We were all excited to see what Lynda had planned for us.Matty provided music as we all headed over to the Upper Room to begin. Craig Bosco pulled into the church parking lot just as we arrived. And the evening began.The atmosphere was rather relaxed as we introduced ourselves and shared a bit. We had two main talks over the weekend- The Parts of the Church done by Father Joel and Church History done by Father Eric. Yet one of the highlights of the weekend was the beach sunset. We gathered together on the beach as Lynda explained her thoughts behind bringing us here and Bible passages were read along with prayers. The van ride back was filled with the tunes of "My Girl" and "Here Comes the Sun". All in all it was a good trip. Upon our return Lynda set up for our "baptism". Silence filled the room as we each lit our candles and prayed. Lynda told us our next activity for the night was to make rosaries, which proved a much more difficult task than it sounded. But we all managed, and after praying with them, it was off to bed. Once again Craig and Matty filled Trimble with the melodic tunes of "Best of Me" and many of our favorite church songs. By that time, it was lights out and the iPods were on. The next day went by fairly quickly, with the Church History talk given. Before we knew it, it was time to go.

To briefly sum up our Confirmation weekend, it was full of music, prayers, lessons, laughter and pictures. But more importantly, it prepared us all for the big step we were about to take in our church life. While the weekend was fun, it was more about bringing us closer to God and preparing us to fully except him into our lives by our own choice.

Now looking back on our weekend together, I'm not sure if I could have made the decision to be confirmed otherwise. While the class helped a lot in preparing me, it also brought me closer to those around me who helped me figure out it was my time and that I was ready for this step. Confirmation was indeed everything I had been told it would be, and my friends were all there to help me along the way.