Hello I'm Connor Wilkins!

Hello everybody, my name is Connor Wilkins and I will be blogging about my journey and excursion to NCYC this year! A little about myself...I'm a senior at Chelmsford High School, Vice-president of my senior class, I play basketball and volleyball for the high school and I'm a member of Class Representatives and a committee head in L.I.M.E (Leadership In Motion Everywhere). I'm also in a band with some of my good friends and two fellow parishioners, Ryan Wholey and Matt Lavallee.

But enough bragging...

So as soon as I found out about NCYC I was very interested as to what it was. After a few hours of watching videos, looking up pictures, and researching NCYC I became very, very excited. The most exciting part is the people. Over 23,000 kids, the same age as me, will be there. It will also be amazing to experience this with some great friends and amazing kids. Going to something like this will help me to see that there are others out there like me, and that the things I do and the people I meet aren't just constrained to St. Johns and MA. Also, the workshops. I know that as a Catholic teen going to a non-catholic high school and basically living in a world that tries to draw me away from my religion, it's hard to keep on the right path. So, at NCYC there are workshops and lectures for everything you can imagine. I know that personally, I will be going to a few workshops, specifically ones pertaining to faith in athletics and on how to keep my faith strong despite what the world wants me to do. I hope that I take a tremendous leap forward in my faith this weekend and learn to keep my faith strong in all circumstances. What I learn at NCYC are things that I will bring back to my fellow parishioners and youth ministers so we can help keep the community we have here going strong. Lastly, I'm really hoping to immerse myself in the community there and lose who I am as a person. I feel like the best way to find out who you really are is to lose yourself in something bigger than just you and see what you can make of yourself afterwards. I hope I find my Catholic voice and grow stronger in my faith, I know I will.

Hope that you all keep reading as we go forward on our journey!

God Bless,

Connor Wilkins