Teen commits to living her faith

At first, Shannon Perkins attended Confirmation classes at St. Peter's parish in Saratoga Springs to please her parents, get confirmed and finally be able to make Church-related decisions on her own.

The process, however, raised questions and made her face her beliefs. By the time of her Confirmation, she found herself in a radically different place.

"Am I doing this for my parents?" she asked herself. "I thought about it. 'No,' I said, 'I'm going to do this for me.'"

Teen and faith

Shannon, now 18, recalled that "my mother said that 'sometimes, when you least expect it, you'll need someone to rely on and believe in.' That made an impact because it's true. That was an important decision for me. It helped set up situations and decisions in my future. It made me realize that there's something a little more to life."

Thanks to her experience with Confirmation classes, she decided not to cease involvement with the Church, but to increase it.

Inspired by the peer leaders at her Confirmation retreat, Shannon became a peer leader herself and helped to run retreats and prayer services for this year's Confirmation class.

Benefits

The experience brought Shannon closer to her brother, who was a Confirmation student this year. It also placed her in a new situation: as a leader and role model for others.

"The people on the retreat were only a year younger than us, so it's not that big of a difference," she explained. "We're able to talk to them, to actually have an impact. Me and my brother talk about it a lot, still. The experience was a very interesting and moving one."

Together with peer leaders from Our Lady of Grace parish in Ballston Spa and with the help of the two parishes' youth ministers, the students developed an "interactive retreat" that led students from raucous icebreakers to quiet moments of reflection that prepared students for a decision to make their Confirmations.

Trust me

One of the most effective parts of the ten-hour retreat they developed, Shannon said, was the "trust walk," in which peer leaders blindfolded students and led them down a path.

It was very much like "putting your trust in God," Shannon said. "There needs to be someone you can fall back on and trust throughout your life, and that's a very important thing to keep in mind, especially during the teen years."

Off to college

The experience helped Shannon to process one of the biggest changes in her own life: leaving home to attend Marist College in Poughkeepsie.

After living in Saratoga and being involved at St. Peter's for most of her life, she sometimes feels "terrified of moving out. [But] it's something that you have to do in life."

Her faith, she said, will help her make that transition. "Just believing in something, and that something is always going to be there for you," she noted, "even though things might not always work out the way you want them to."

Better than before

Shannon said that going through the Confirmation process -- and then helping others do the same -- made her a "stronger person."

"I am stronger in my decisions," she explained. "Just making the decision to do Confirmation set me up for a lot of decisions in my life, and they are all going to lead up to what defines me as a person.

"God is a constant in everyone's lives. You can always know that He's there."

(Shannon intends on choosing a college major in either art or English. A senior at Saratoga Springs High School, she is taking two AP classes in those subjects, participates in spring softball and is active in the National Honor Society. Thousands of Catholic teens in the Albany Diocese are helped by the annual Bishop's Appeal. Funds provide training for catechists, support for faith formation leaders and the budget for the Albany diocesan youth ministry.)

(5/11/06) [[In-content Ad]]