Youth

This has been a hard year for everyone, but I think the youth have had more struggles than we are aware of, personally, in school, church, work, and home. They left school one Friday in March and didn’t go back for months. Their worlds got turned upside down and, like the rest of us, they had to adapt on their feet. No matter what, these kids have risen to the occasion and have been absolutely amazing.

Sunday School

Sunday School unintentionally met for the last time in mid February. My son was sick, and then the retina in my good eye detached. The plan was to start Sunday School again after my surgery, but COVID-19 hit in the middle of all of that so we did not have another inperson class for Sunday School to end the second semester of the school year in Spring, 2020. Our hopes were high with having full classes to start the Fall 2020 semester and we purchased new curriculum for the Middle School/High School class. Unfortunately, when trying to confirm students for the school year, there were only a couple of maybes for the elementary age class so it was decided to just have the MS/HS class. Our first couple of classes had most of the kids (6–8) but the majority of classes have only had 4 students. We finished the first session in The Relationship Project and then started working on our Christmas “play.” Our last couple of classes in December were held via Zoom to be in compliance with the Governor’s ordinances. Our Christmas play was a short video that was shared on our social media pages.

Our goals for the coming year is to increase class sizes, and to finish The Relationship Project. We will be beginning Session Two on January 10.

SOYO

We had a few Zoom check-ins during the spring to just talk and pray together. We held out hope for as long as possible but Camp St. Raphael was canceled for the summer and everyone was pretty heartbroken about it. CSR did an amazing job by still sending out shirts and doing some virtual camp sessions that teens were able to join in on.

SOYO has been incredible with philanthropic efforts. Whenever a need has been seen, these teens have jumped at the opportunity to help. In July, the Siouxland Community Health Center made a Facebook post asking for help with supplies for their mobile shower unit. The teens decided to spend $200, and a couple of teens and I did the shopping and dropped off the supplies. In August, SOYO sent $200 to St. John Orthodox in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, to help with the ongoing cleanup efforts after the derecho affected so many. For the last three months of the 2020 year, SOYO sponsored food/item drives benefiting a different charity each month. October was The Food Bank and 89 lbs. of food were donated. November was The Warming Shelter and over 40 pairs of socks, 9 lbs. of food, and other various items were delivered. December’s donations were directed to The Soup Kitchen/Erik’s Closet. Donations are still being collected at the time of this report so a final total will be made known soon.

The first weekend in October, we participated in a DOWAMA SOYO virtual retreat. It included a guest speaker, breakout questions, and games. We ended our afternoon together with pizza and Great Vespers. November gave us the opportunity be creative at The Pickled Palette, and create our own pottery designs.

Our goals for the next year will be to get as many kids to camp as possible. We will need to do some sort of fundraiser this coming year as well, since we have done so much with giving to those in need.

In all, St. Thomas has amazing youth in our church. Do all you can to support them, love them, and encourage them.

Erica Ameen