Saint Meinrad Receives Grant to Continue Outreach to Young Adult Catholics

St. Meinrad – Saint Meinrad Archabbey has received a grant from Lilly Endowment Inc. to continue its outreach to young adult Catholics.

A grant of $1.25 million will support the second phase of Saint Meinrad’s Young Adult Initiative. The primary goal of this phase of the program is to support Catholic parishes and ministry leaders in reimagining their approaches to young adult outreach, accompaniment, and discipleship.

During the five-year grant period, Saint Meinrad plans to:

• create a parish guide for ministry with young adults;
• develop resources and offer workshops for bishops, priests, deacons, and laity from across the United States to inform them of the Phase 1 findings and promote usage of the parish guide; and
• invite some of the parishes that Saint Meinrad worked with during Phase 1 to continue their young adult engagement efforts and become mentors to neighboring parishes.

“In this second phase of the Young Adult Initiative, Saint Meinrad wants to offer a concrete guide for forming a parish culture that is open and responsive to the needs of affiliated and unaffiliated young adults,” said Tammy Becht, interim director of Saint Meinrad’s Center for Youth and Young Adult Evangelization.

“We intend to provide Catholic leaders methods for parish accompaniment of young people so more parishes will realize increased engagement with young adults in their communities,” she said. “Parishes will be challenged to create a parish vision and plan that will engage young people. As this work progresses, we will share the results at workshops and conferences for ministry leaders.”