The Middle School Service Week is a week of service for middle school students (students who will be in grades 6-8 in the 2018-2019 school year) who are hungry to impact their world. While being rooted in the themes of Catholic Social Teaching, students will participate in Mass, reflect on the theme, and engage in activities. Then they will take it to the streets, serving the people of Rochester as a concrete way of showing God’s love. The goal is to give students an opportunity to draw closer to Jesus Christ while developing a heart to serve those around them.

God has a history of making order out of chaos. In the beginning, He formed all of creation out of a dark void. In the Psalms, He makes wars cease, and there is stillness and peace in Him. In the Gospels, Jesus calmed the wild seas when the disciples were caught and afraid for their lives in a storm. Jesus’ very mission on this earth was to bring the order of redemption out of the chaos of the fall. Jesus also took breaks from chaos. “Early in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up and slipped out to a solitary place to pray.” After a day of preaching to the crowds, Jesus tells His disciples to go ahead of Him and goes up a mountain by Himself to pray. Jesus “frequently withdrew to the wilderness to pray.” A retreat is a break from the norm, an act of withdrawing. This retreat (or service week in this case) leads teens out of chaos and distractions of daily life and into a relationship with God who can transform their chaos into something beautiful.