Hello dear readers!

Today's blog post finds my team and I in Cincinnati, Ohio. At this point in the year, we have put on 87 retreats and have ministered to 4,950 youth. I personally have ministered to 240 young ladies in my small groups since January. God truly has been working through my team this year.

As our time on NET comes to a close, (only 33 days left until I am back in New Hampshire!), I'm constantly aware of how much I take things for granted.

I take my family for granted; I take my NET team for granted; I take for granted the fact that random people are generous enough to open their houses to us; I take my life for granted. And worst of all? I take God for granted.  Because I grew up Catholic, I've always just assumed that God would always be there for me. I've always rested assure in the fact that no matter what I do, as long as I seek true contrition and go to Confession, God forgives me and loves me endlessly.

However, this isn't the case for many of the youth we meet. NET is a strictly Catholic organization. We only go to Catholic churches and schools. Granted, not everyone on those retreats are Catholic, and that's totally okay. We love them just the same as everyone else.

Sadly though, even the Catholic youth we meet don't really understand or even know the Faith to be true. Yes, they have their classes, but what the women in my small group always tell me is that they don't understand how the Faith can be so important if their parents don't take them to Mass. So many of the ladies I minister to know tons of facts about Christ and the Church, but they only see God as this guy up in the sky condemning them.

One retreatant in particular sticks out to me.

Recently my team and I hosted a 12 1/2 hour retreat, and I had a small group of seventeen 8th grade ladies. Our conversation in small group ranged all over the place that day, but the thing that kept coming up was God's love.

Unbeknownst to me, one of the girls in my small group had been quite bullied growing up, and on the bus ride to the retreat site, some boys, who didn't know her, started bullying her because she stood up to them and told them to stop joking about the holocaust.  Throughout the day they kept finding ways to bother her. It eventually got to a point where she came to me crying and she begged me to let her go home. I got her in contact with the deacon of the parish she was from, and she agreed to stay for a couple more hours.

Luckily, we had come to the part of the retreat where we had seperate men and women's session. The ladies hear a talk that goes over how God sees them as beautiful, beloved, and worthy. Afterwards, we had a time of small group and it was crazy to see the effect that the women's session had on her. She stood taller, laughed, invested in our small group, and had a wonderful confidence in herself. I truly believe that God confirmed in her heart just how precious she is to Him.

So my dear readers,

How do you see yourself? Do you see yourself as precious in God's eyes? If not, what will it take for you to believe?

I'll be praying for you - pray for my team and me!

In Christ though Mary's Immaculate Heart,

Michaela Donovan