Dear CYO Athletics Community,
In last month's e-letter reflection we looked at the celebration of the Feast of Corpus Christi and how we are called to use the gifts we have been given to be bread broken and wine poured out in service to others and that we are reminded of this at the end of each Mass. In this Sunday's gospel, Jesus summons the Twelve and sends them out two by two for the beginning of their ministry. In a reflection on July 12th of this Gospel, Fr. Juan Molina, OSST focuses on the fact that Jesus tells them to limit the "baggage" they bring with them and what this means for us.
Certainly, as a minister, as a coach, as a parent, we need to be aware of the baggage that we bring to the experience of those entrusted to our care. Some of it is ingrained in us as personality traits (nature) and some of it is formed in us behaviorally through our surroundings (nurture). In any case, it exists. Some of our baggage is positive and some of it negative.
In the recently concluded 10th Annual Play Like A Champion Today � Leadership Conference, we were reminded in a variety of ways that we need to be intentional about how we use our roles as ministers, coaches, parents and administrators to shape our young people to be the best they can be.
As we travel through the experiences of our summer, we should take stock of those parts of us that we want to bring to the experience of our children and athletes and those elements that they would be best without. Of course, since we are human, this is no simple feat of sorting through the "good" and the "bad". Living lives rooted in faith, reflection and prayer can assist us in this process as well as empower us with the Cardinal virtues of fortitude, justice, prudence and temperance when our human frailty emerges.
I recently was forwarded an article by a colleague on Tony Robichaux, Head Baseball Coach at the University of Louisiana-Lafayette. In it, this very successful coach talks about what means most to him and what he tries to intentionally create in his players:
"However, I don't think coaches should be judged on victories, but on how their players are doing in life five or 10 years after leaving college. Did the boys who entered your school become men who put God first, family second and themselves last? Are they leaders who take what you've given them and given that to others? Those are the standards that matter.
I don't want to produce a bunch of players with only athletic courage, because that comes easily to young men. What I want to do is produce virtuous men who have moral courage. That's the real test of a man: whether he has the strength to say and do the right things out of inner conviction when others are expecting him to lower his standards and go the easy route of the world." In the end, our openness to continually refining the baggage we carry with us and being intentional about our efforts to live out our role to the best of our ability, we in turn equip those we coach or parent, to be the best they are capable of becoming in their inner life so that their outer life reflects the disciple they are called to be. May we pack light and impact big! Blessings, ~Tauno Latvala Director of CYO Athletics |