Father Kennerley, the provincial, started a new Ministry in 2015 called Youth and Evangelisation.
Currently there are two Marists involved in school chaplaincy. They work although at St Patrick’s College, Wellington and at St Patrick’s College, Silverstream.
The two Marists are Fr Pat Brophy ( St Pat’s) and Fr Pat Breeze (Silverstream). These Marists work together with the local ministry team at the colleges to ensure both Chaplaincy services and evangelisation.
Today many young people enter Catholic Schools without a great deal of Catholicity in their background.
Often this is due to no fault of their own.
The pupils are interested in the Faith and are open to learning more about it, they just have not had much chance to do so either because they were not fortunate enough to go to a Catholic primary school or they have missed opportunities in their parish to receive sacraments and other instruction.
The Youth and Evangelisation ministry then identifies some of these gaps and helps the youth to bridge that gap so that they can take a fuller part in their faith.
There are also some young people who would like to be baptised and sometimes they have a family member who is already a Catholic but circumstances have meant that they just missed opportunities.
Each year there are catch-up programmes for these young men so that they can participate more fully in the spiritual life offered in their school and the Catholic Church.
The ministry teams at the colleges work with the Marists in each school to plan liturgy and other Catholic character programmes and together they help deliver on the outcomes desired.
