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Don Bosco Youth Services (DBYS), BIRDY, Hyderabad, 19 July 2020: The Don Bosco Youth Services (DBYS), brings the attention of the youth across Andhra Pradesh and Telangana together to unravel the world’s most complex social and environmental problems during Covid-19 through online competitions.The new youth director, Fr B Charan initiated this creative and yet inspiring concept with a timely help and coordination from the local Parish and BIRDY Youth. He said, ‘Their different cultural, social, and geographic insights will enable new solutions and ways of working together, providing a unique model for comprehensive collaboration and problem-solving’. The online competitions are categorized into two: 1. Singing and Fancy dress for children (10-15 Age) and 2. Singing and Awareness on Covid-19 for Youth (16 Years and above). The competition is remote and will see students forming remote groups of 4-5 people to work on an idea for a venture that solves a pressing need for the World over 100 days due to corona virus pandemic.
The remote competitions began on 9 July 2020 and within a short span, 310 applications have already reached the office. Individual or Teams are competing for a chance to win up to Rs 4500 in prize money to develop their ideas further and will participate the Finals on 24 July 2020.
As a preparation for the same, an online youth mass was organized on 19 July by Fr Thathireddy Vijaya Bhaskar, Provincial via YouTube. As many as 116 youth participated in the online mass. Fr Provincial, in his homily drawn a beautiful message for the youth from the ‘Parable of the weeds among the wheat’ that sees the kingdom of heaven to be like a farmer who sows good seed and then is surprised to find it also contains weeds. The weeds and the wheat must be allowed to grow together until the time of harvest, because, like a mustard seed or like yeast, the kingdom will grow and expand. The Holy Eucharist for the youth ended with a vote of thanks by Ms Lucy, a youth member of BIRDY youth.
Later, a short interactive session was held by Fr Pappula Sudhakar, the secretary to SIGNIS. SIGNIS is a Roman Catholic lay ecclesial movement for professionals in the communication media, including press, radio, television, cinema, video, media education, internet, and new technology. It is a non-profit organization with representation from over 100 countries. He said that youth needs to become Young communicators from SIGNIS and reflect on their role in a pandemic world.
