After months of meetings and planning, we were finally down under, but it didn't take me long to realise that this trip was very different. There was something there that gave me - along with everyone else from our group - a very different view of religion, and the Catholic Church. To see thousands of young people walking through the streets of Sydney, dancing and singing and just having fun was amazing. We met people from Canada to Korea, from Colombia to France, all who had a positive attitude towards religion. And there were no adults putting pressure on young people to be there - everyone was there because they wanted to be. I got the feeling that it was ok to take an interest in my faith and to get involved in our church. I realised that religion was much more than mass on a Sunday morning, or a few prayers. This trip was definitely not just a holiday to Australia.

A while after WYD, I was back to college and back to the normal routine. But I still felt like I wanted to become involved in the church more. I was given this opportunity to experience religion in a totally different way, celebrating my faith with hundreds of thousands of young people from across the globe. Now, I realised that I wanted to recreate these experiences I had with the young people in Sydney with the youth in our diocese. Fr. Nolan, one of the priests involved in WYD and the DYC asked Kate and I to become part of the youth council. I knew this was my chance to get involved and to let others know about our church. Since then I feel like I am making a difference - albeit a small one. Through my involvement in the DYC I have come to realise that this is our church, our diocese, and our turn to make a difference.