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There are many vibrant Vincentian Marian Youth organizations throughout the Province of the West whose members continue to live out and spread the message of Love to others.  These organizations have helped their members to become closer to Blessed Mother Mary and to Jesus, and their members are daily witnesses of God's compassion and love to the Poor.

These organizations are listed below.

• De Marillac Academy School
• Mother of Sorrow School
• Our Lady of Talpa School
• Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal School
• Our Lady of the Visitacion School
• Sacred Heart Cathedral Preparatory High School
• St. Anthony Parish - Anchorage, Alaska: Vincentian Marian Youth - Faith in Action Together
• St. Elizabeth Seton School
• St. Patrick School
• St. Vincent Depaul School
• St. Vincent School
  

If you would like to share information about your particular organization, please email our website administrator by clicking here.  Alternatively, you can call us at (650) 949-8919.  When you make the request to share your information, we can create a link to your website from here.  If you do not currently have a website, you can provide us with the information and we can post it on this website.

As all Vincentian Marian Youth organizations belong to the same family, we encourage the sharing of success stories, and lessons learned.  This information is invaluable to a newly formed organization.

Our Lady of the Visitacion School

Hello everyone, my name is Lawrence Ellison and I am a teacher and the VMY Moderator here at Our Lady of the Visitacion School in San Francisco, California.

I was approached by my principal, Sr. Chris Maggi, D.C. at the end of the 2005-2006 school year to see if I would like to take on a new youth group called VMY. Sr. Chris told me that the Daughters of Charity are sponsoring this program and having known the DC’s since I was 5 years old, I knew this VMY program that the DC’S wanted to start in their schools would be a great blessing not only to the school community but the surrounding communities. I took on the project with the help of St. Vincent, St. Louise, and Mother Mary as my guardians.

I started our 2006-2007 school year off by becoming a VMY Core Group Member and VMY Pioneer of the Province of the West along with my brothers and sisters in VMY Core Team.

I have been truly blessed in meeting these wonderful people of VMY. They truly been a wonderful support, friends, brothers and sisters in Christ.

In October, I asked the VMY Core Team to come to OLV to have a kick off rally. They were just as excited as I was to get this VMY project off the ground. I truly did not know how the school community would react to this lively and exciting new youth group program.

The rally was a great success and went very well. Many students still ask for the VMY members to come back. From the rally, 55 students joined VMY which is a huge group. Grades 4 to 8 are allowed to join the meetings. We have Our VMY meetings every other Tuesday after school for 1 hour to discuss what we can do for our school, parish, and other in our community.

Our first activity was to do a canned food drive for the family in our school and parish. We fed 15 families; we had turkeys, other meats, canned foods and money donations to give away. It was a great success. The students gave the Thanksgiving baskets to the families and said a prayer of thanks with each family.

We just finished the Toiletries Drive for the elderly. We collected 8 large boxes of toiletries for the elderly at an old age home. We will deliver the toiletries and visit with the elderly and also read them stories, talk about the Vincentian Saints, pray with them or just to sit and keep them company.

At the end of February, we will start making rosaries to hand out to those who would like to have them and also to send to the missionaries and reservations that the DC’s works with.

Many other scheduled projects will happen with the grace of God and our Vincentian Saints with the help of Mary.

For myself I am so happy and blessed to be a part of VMY. The D.C’s. have done so much for people all over the world and this is one more thing that they are doing.

Since my consecration in VMY, I have become so much stronger in my faith and love for Mary and my church. I also have opened my eyes to all God’s people and really learned how to love, and care for them as much as I can. Our VMY motto here at OLV is “One with Mary, one with the church, one with the children, together with St. Vincent”. We have a wonderful student body here as well as a wonderful Faculty and Staff. We are very blessed to have the DC here at school to help us with our Vincentian spirit.

May God bless you and all your work. I will leave you with one of my favorite quotes.

Everything we do is just a drop in the ocean, but if we don’t do it…that drop is missing. (Mother Teresa)

St. Anthony Parish - Anchorage, Alaska:  Vincentian Marian Youth - Faith in Action Together

Award Recognition for VMY in Alaska, Province of the West

St. Anthony’s VMY/FIAT Youth Group has won another award!!!  They have been chosen to receive a Spirit of Youth award.  Spirit of Youth is a nonprofit organization who recognizes youth state-wide who have had a positive impact on their community.  There are two finalists in each of eleven categories and St. Anthony’s VMY/FIAT Youth Group was selected as one of two finalists in the “Faith-based Service” category, for their participation in such activities as their Food Fasts, Clergy, Cops and Kids, clean-up of San Antonio Park, etc.  They were selected by their peers from 120 nominations and they will be presented with a trophy at the Spirit of Youth Banquet in March.  Congratulations VMY/FIAT Youth and keep up the great service to our community.  You can read more about Spirit of Youth at www.spiritofyouth.org.

1. VMY-FIAT of St. Anthony Catholic Church, Anchorage, Alaska is very busy with their annual community projects and adding a number of new "service" oriented activities to their list.  Besides adopting and maintaining the upkeep of a local children's park (which just happens to be named "San Antonio" Park) in our neighborhood, we have held "Halloween Carnival" for the neighborhood children.
2. One week after that tremendous undertaking, we prepared and sold food at our St. Anthony's Annual Bazaar to raise money for our youth group's activities and travels. 
3. This weekend, Nov. 18/19, the VMY-FIAT youth group is participating in a 24 hour Food Fast to raise money to assist in buying food for Thanksgiving Baskets for those who are not able to provide a traditional Thanksgiving meal for themselves.
4. Our VMY-FIAT youth who are participating in the Youth in Theology and Ministry program at St. John's University, Collegeville, MN. are planning four special "Cultural" evenings for our local community.  These cultural evenings are meant to highlight our cultural diversity as a parish.  Our first cultural celebration will be a Polynesian evening on Dec. 3rd.  It will include food, friendship, music and cultural "information."  The future will include evenings highlighting the Alaska Native culture, Filipino culture, Hispanic culture; and we hope to culminate these with a Senior Prom for our Senior Citizens, combining all our cultures for a Unity in Diversity theme.
5. VMY-FIAT participated in their third Clergy/Cops/ Kids gatherings.  Nine of our youth joined others from different congregation to sit down at a table and talk with Police Officers, mediated by clergy.  The goal for this dialogue is to promote communication, to dispel stereotypes, and build trusting relationships so that together (youth and cops) can build a safe environment for youth.

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