I remember the first time I decided I really wanted to take my faith seriously.
I grew up attending St. Timothy Church in Chantilly with my family for as long as I can remember. I paid attention sometimes, but it was always more a habit than a relationship.
Coming into college, I had seen a worrying statistic: Around 70 percent of young people who enter college as professing Christians don’t leave that way. This knowledge made me want to get in touch with my faith in a real way, but during the COVID lockdowns, that became increasingly difficult, until I found St. Robert Bellarmine Chapel on the campus of George Mason University in Fairfax. One day on campus, I was walking into the student center and had a chance encounter with one of the FOCUS missionaries from the Catholic Campus Ministry. Although it seemed like nothing at the time, it became the seed of a lasting friendship and the start of a wonderful journey deeper into relationship with Christ.
As I began to get more involved, I started to lead our RCIA program along with a student who had come into the church the previous year, as a way to both grow myself and to provide others with the knowledge I had gained. That year, at the 2023 Easter Vigil, we brought 13 souls into full communion with Christ’s church, in probably the most beautiful moment I have ever experienced. Not a single person’s eyes were dry in the entire front row. I watched three friends receive the sacrament of baptism, one make a profession of faith and several receive the sacrament of confirmation, in perhaps the largest single outpouring of God’s grace I have witnessed.
This year, I have the absolute pleasure of leading our religious education program, along with another student leader and two students who came into the church just last year. We are projected to bring about the same number of people into the church this year — with even more baptisms —through the superabundant grace which the Lord has given us.
None of this would be remotely possible without the generosity of those who give to the Bishop’s Lenten Appeal. Our students have received immense benefit from the gifts we are able to offer, all from the hearts Christ has inflamed with self-giving love. We are eternally grateful, and we know God will bless BLA supporters abundantly. Thank you!
Exley is a senior at George Mason University in Fairfax.
