Youth Ministry Retreats and Activities

Retreats and activities are excellent opportunities to learn more about the Catholic Christian faith in a setting that is fun, relaxed, natural and away from normal daily duties. Retreats and activities are not only popular with youth but prove to be successful as youth leave their day-to-day environment behind and set aside real time to find out more about God, themselves and one another.

Retreats and activities are offered to the youth each year. See the In Touch and On the Rock webpages for calendar dates/times, locations and other information.



Winter Retreat includes prayer, talks and discussion focus on aspects of the theme chosen for the weekend. This retreat is open to all youth grades 6-12. The retreat is directed by the Director of Youth Ministry, but is facilitated by middle and high school peer ministers, off-site. This retreat is scheduled for November. Please see the Youth Ministry Calendar for dates.

Confirmation Retreat for 10th grade, led by the high school Core Team, usually on Super Bowl weekend held at Camp Friendship.

9th Grade Confirmation Retreat led by National Evangelization Teams (NET) Ministries, is typically scheduled in May. 

Mission Trips and Summer Camps are a great way to be adventurous, experience new surroundings and people, and dive into how faith and travel can really change your life. Check out the many trips St. Joseph has offered their youth ministry groups.


There is always something exciting coming up at St. Joe's for the youth.
Community building is a great way to get involved, make new friends, and build your faith

Grill Night! Once each month in the summer, we grill, eat, laugh and play yard games. All youth are invited, so bring your friends! St. Joseph provides the meat, veggie burgers, buns and condiments. Youth chip in by bringing veggies, fruit, dessert or chips to share.   

Sleep Out for the Homeless. An annual event that invites all youth, grades 6-12, to come together to get a short glimpse of what it might be like to be homeless. All registered participants must come with their own cardboard box or tent, a donation for PRISM and the warmest gear they have to lounge around in or to sleep in.

Sandwich Making at Serenity Village Community Church occurs every Monday evening from 5pm - 6pm (4100 Douglas Drive North, Crystal, MN). Enter at ground level from the parking lot behind the church.

WHY SHOULD YOU GO ON A RETREAT? 

1) You need rest - time away from you normal daily work. Retreats allow us to dedicate time to the Lord and restore ourselves so that we might be better disciples of Christ. Without this necessary and holy rest, we are quick to burn out in our missionary work as disciples.

2)  Your Savior needed a retreat - Jesus knew that after pouring Himself into His ministry, He needed to fill Himself back up by spending time alone with the Father in prayer. Retreats give us the same opportunity to fill ourselves back up by emulating Christ, Himself, and reconnecting with God in personal prayer.

3)  You need community. - Retreats are perfect opportunities to build community with people, especially people who also care about their faith. Friendships made on retreats are most often formed around a mutual love for Christ, and these relationships are the ones that will get us to heaven.

4)  You need to be on God's time - Retreats give us the chance to step out of our normal routine and live on God’s time, consecrating every moment to Him.

5)  You need reflection -  Retreats encourage us to reflect on who we have been, who we are now, and who God desires us to be in the future.

6)  You need prayer - This prayer happens because we’ve removed ourselves from our day-to-day routine and can listen to God more closely.

7) Your life needs to be opened to God - while on retreat, we should keep our minds and hearts open to the ways in which God might be trying to influence us in order to build us back up anew.

8)  You need reconciliation - Whether or not Reconciliation is included, retreats offer crucial opportunities for us to reconcile with God, others, and ourselves.

9)  You need to receive Jesus to be a disciple -  Retreats allow us to refocus our gaze on Him and reunite our efforts to His Spirit, enabling us to persevere in our mission as disciples.

10)   You need to be open to change in your life - Retreats can be the crucial beginnings to a transformative journey with Christ.

Youth Comments after attending a mission trip:

• This mission thrip taught me the impact that volunteers have on a community. I went to Milwaukee on a mission trip in 2018 and again this year. Many service sites were the same. It was amazing to see improvement in the communities and how passionate the community leaders are about the transforming Milwaukee. Most of the service sites were run by very little staff and rely mostly on volunteers. The change in Milwaukee was awesome and I feel blessed to have been a very small part of that. This trip has me looking for service projects near me to volunteer on a regular basis so I can have that same influence on the community I live in.

• I really enjoyed seeing and learning new ways to help out and contribute to others and not just myself. Even if I thought what I was contributing was small, it was still a big help to other people. Especially when we were at the park and cutting the buckhorn and I didn’t know what I was contributing to, This trip made me realize now even small efforts can be big.    

• I felt complete.

• My life was changed through one of our SJCC leaders. That man is something else entirely.

• That every where you go, there are people who need help and that is why you are there.

• It changed my life by getting to know people better and getting closer to God and grow my faith. I also felt God present following me the whole week and I felt like I have never been closer to God than this week. I am so thankful for everyone I met this week because they are all so nice and loving.  

• This experience changed my life by making me realize that even the littlest amount of work or what seems like nothing can make a huge difference and that people can be very appreciative.  

• Once again, I have been touched by the conviction of the leaders this week, both at YouthWorks and at our work sites. These are solid Believers in Christ and people who are striving to make a difference in the world and their their city. I saw them reaching out in love and investing time, talent, and treasure to build the Kingdom of God. What an amazing testimony they are living.   

• This trip really made me reflect on how I can affect the people around me by doing service. It felt really good to serve others in the Milwaukee community and it made me want to do more service around my own community.   

• This week showed me more about community and resourcefulness. Rick from Grant Park worked to maintain the park with groups of volunteers for free over the past 15 year. They reused the buckthorn to create a fence to protect the hillsides from people creating new trails. This showed me that even in bad situations, when you are creative and resourceful you can come up with solutions. At the end of the week there was a community blog and it showed how everyone can come together and enjoy the moment.
   
• It helped me learn how to open-up my heart to God and Jesus. It helped me to focus more on God, Jesus and my faith. It helped me to enjoy going to Church. It has lead me to a deeper meaning of my Faith. It has helped me to be more thankful for everything God has created. It has helped me to appreciate my life. It has helped me to thank Jesus for sacrificing His life for us. It has helped me to start to open the door to Jesus and God. It has helped me to stop ignoring Jesus and God. It has helped me to pray a lot more. It has helped me to love everything and everyone.
 
• It has changed me because I have grown closer to God with my friends. We came together with Christ by our side and were able to conquer our fears.
 
• I feel closer to God and Jesus and it has helped me to understand them and how to invite them into my life more. It has put me with people my own age that I can relate to.