AIDAN THOMPSON CONFIRMATION PERSONAL FAITH STATEMENTS PEACE UNITED CHURCH OF CHRIST MAY 20, 2018

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1 AIDAN THOMPSON CONFIRMATION PERSONAL FAITH STATEMENTS PEACE UNITED CHURCH OF CHRIST MAY 20, 2018

2 IAN THOMPSON My Faith Statement? For a long time faith meant strict rules. And of course, no one wants strict rules I thought these faith rules were supposed to dictate my life. Then I realized it s nothing like that. Faith isn t a rule. Faith is a journey. Faith makes you question why am I here? how did I get here? why did this happen? why? That s mankind s biggest question. Faith can answer that question By making you ask more questions. Question everything, but there is no one correct answer. It depends on how you see the world and how you see yourself. I think this shows the little connections here and there I have made with people at church and how people at this church really form relationships and care about each other lives which has been a nice formative environment to start and continue my faith journey in. Last but not least, I think I really have to owe my enjoyment of going to church to the youth program here at Peace. The youth group we have is such a positive and supportive close group and I think it s safe to say we enjoy each other s company. I want to thank the previous youth pastor, Pastor Kayla, as well as the newer youth pastor, Pastor Beth, for being positive female influences in my life that have definitely caused me to think more about my faith and the world around me (sorry to exclude you Pastor Paul, you re a cool guy!).

3 HANNAH PAUL ZACH NEVALA I am a very visual person. I like to document my life by taking pictures of things. For this reason, I felt there was no better way to show my faith journey other than by photos. On my board I have pictures of Alabama, where I was born and baptized and where my faith journey started. I wasn t even a year old when we moved to Minnesota and was only two when we joined Peace. This is where personally it seems my faith journey truly began. My early memories and the beginning of relationships started in the Sunday school classrooms and trips to Good Earth Village. Of course on my board, there isn t every single memory, if I wanted that I would have needed a much bigger board! At the beginning of confirmation I thought of it as a waste of time. Now as I look back I think of it as a great experience that uncovered what I think about my faith and has changed my outlook on life. The people around me have also helped me along my faith journey. My family has also been a big help in my faith journey. I still don t exactly know what God means to me in my life, so my faith journey so far has just been questioning everything about my faith. As I continue to ask questions I will continue to uncover what my faith means to me. Questions like Why are we here? and Why does this happen? will help me to more understand life and God. I believe my faith is shaped by my church family. Some people that weren t on my board but that are honorable mentions include: Bruce Adams, Jody Morbeck, Julie Timmerman, Bruce Dahlen, and so many other peoples names that I can t think of right now, but that are still a huge part of my life. A family that I need to mention if I m going to talk about special connections with people at church would have to be the DeYoung family: Tom, Laurie, Carter, and Neal. I have so many fond memories of our families hanging out, whether it was the 4th of July or Easter or some other event; they always have felt like family and for that I m so grateful. Speaking of other nice church relationships with church people I have, I have always seemed to hug certain people at church and vice versa (you could say I m a hugger). Two main people are Bruce Dahlen and Bruce Adams, who are both very kind family friends of ours that have always been there for me. Another wonderful person I do this with is Macy Loechler who s a fellow youth (junior in high school) and has always been a friend since my first years of being in the youth group as a little 6th grader.

4 ABBY ALCOCK I also believe in science and medicine. I like having an explanation about how and why the world works the way it does. I like facts and I don t like something that isn t explainable. However, I do believe in miracles, medical and otherwise. I believe in morals, too, but just because you have good morals doesn t mean or make them Christian morals. I think morals like not killing someone or stealing for the heck of it are more just common sense and decency that something on the 10 commandments. When I met with Beth, she told me that she is asking us to be, critical thinkers, not blind believers, and that is what I did. So in a way I have created my own faith system that works for me throughout my confirmation journey. Throughout confirmation, I have found a voice to speak out about my beliefs and accept who I am as a person. My faith has grown, yes, but it is also so much more than that now. Opening up was overwhelming at first but now I can not imagine going back to who I was in the past. The church has become my home, a second family where I can be myself, ask questions, and feel safe. For that, I thank everyone who has supported me through the good times as well as the bad. In this painting, two trees are shown. The first tree represents the simple mindset I had acquired in my earlier faith years when I only showed up because my mom made me. The second tree symbolizes how I have grown in my faith. Now I understand how faith impacts every aspect of my life in a positive way, even outside the church walls. The tree is filled with life, just as faith has allowed my own life to be open to new opportunities and ideas. Throughout confirmation, my confidence has grown. And so, like a tree, I hope to continue to grow so that I can inspire others to grow around me as well.

5 ANNALIESA DIEKVOSS LORELI BENTZ I define myself as spiritual, but not religious. However, my belief system is slightly different. I believe in a universal force that makes everything happen for a reason, whether that reason is known or not. I believe that the littlest things that you may not think would make a difference, impact your life in someway. I believe in karma to some degree. I believe that everyone that has ever been in your life was there for a reason. It could be that they teach you how to love or how to forgive or being humble or patient or seeing something from a different perspective. Whomever it is that s been in your life, past or present, has taught you a lesson. I believe in an afterlife. I ve always been curious about what happens after you die. Do you get reincarnated or do you just keep reliving your life over and over again. Is it a blank space of nothingness? Or do you go to heaven, and if so, what is heaven? Is heaven how it is described in the bible or does everyone have their own version of heaven, so that it is personal to you. What if when you die you watch your life like it s a movie, and the end credits is every person or animal that has ever been an active part in your life at some point or another. What if you get a statistics sheet about your life. Like how many times you ve laughed or cried, your favorite things and memories. I created this piece based on Jeremiah 18:4, But the jar he was making did not turn out as he had hoped, so he crushed it into a lump of clay again and started over. The meaning of the piece is that, like in the text, this piece was re-done 10 times, crumpling the paper and tossing it in the trash and starting over, until I was satisfied with how it came out. I drew this piece because I enjoy drawing whenever given the chance. I enjoyed researching for the names I gave to the characters, Allah and Kanto. Allah meaning God in Arabic, Kanto meaning Artist in Malagasy, the native language of Madagascar.

6 ERICK RIST What do I believe about God who created me and all that exists? I believe God created everything and everyone. I believe He sees and controls everything that happens in life. He does everything in the name of love and His main goal is peace and love. He has never done anything with the end goal being violence or hatred. What do I believe about Jesus Christ, who became human, died and rose again? I believe Jesus Christ is the only Son of God. I believe that His ultimate goal was to carry out the will of God directly to the people of earth. I believe He died to forgive everybody's sins and he came back alive and escalated into heaven and he will come again in the future. What do I believe about the Holy Spirit, who is with me and gives me spiritual gifts (love, joy, peace, faith, hope, etc.) I believe the Holy Spirit gives humans faith to praise the one true God. It gives us hope in times there is none. It gives us peace when we are anxious or stressed. I believe it gives us love when we are feeling hate. It gives us joy and optimism when it s a bad day or we are feeling down. I believe the Holy Spirit is with everyone all the time giving these gifts. What does my faith mean to me? My faith is something that is part of me. Faith is something that assures that everything will be ok in the end. This doesn t mean everything in life will go exactly the way you want it to but you can make it through and try and make the situation better with the reassurance of faith. The definition of faith is a strong belief in God or in the doctrines of a religion, based on spiritual apprehension rather than proof. I am a math and science guy therefore I like having clear, logical answers so believing in Christianity can be hard sometimes, because there is no proof. Over the past months of confirmation I have started believing that there is no real answer to all the millions of questions about faith and that you don t need all the answers to believe something. How will my faith help in the future? My faith will help in the future by having the knowledge that someone who maybe doesn t know that much about Christianity. It could help if I wanted to teach someone about my religion and they could teach me about theirs. Not that I am wanting to, but if I was going to become a pastor my faith would obviously help.

7 ANNA HAUG PETER HAUG For my faith statement project I made a painting. This painting represents the steps throughout my faith journey. I used green for baptism, which represents new beginnings. The yellow and orange in my painting show the early stages of my faith journey. The yellow represents youth and the orange represents connection. I used yellow because I was not as involved or aware of what faith really meant. The orange shows my connection to my family and friends. I used purple and black to represent confusion and doubt. The last color I used was blue to represent the new ideas and what I can still do for the church. The confirmation process has taught me a lot about what our church wants to do to help others and it has given me a better understanding of the church. Going into confirmation I was unsure about my faith as a whole. I looked at confirmation as a way to better understand the UCC but I didn t think it would influence where I was with my faith. For the most part I was correct, but going through confirmation still forced me to reconcile my beliefs and analyze where I was with my views. I am not sure where I stand in my faith. In a sense, I feel there is no right answer for faith. Everyone has beliefs that shape who they are and how they act, and I feel I cannot elevate one belief to be more important than any other. Since going to Peace I have gained a new way of looking at the world and the role of the community in it. Peace s message of social action and love is something I want to be a part of whatever my religious beliefs are. Growing up in an ELCA community, I developed a very strong connection to my faith, and as I have grown my beliefs have grown with me. So when I had to develop my confirmation project I wanted it to be something that truly represented who I was. I wanted it to be something only I could completely understand. While I do not like the formatting of I am From poems, I felt it would be a clear way to show not only my faith journey but also my journey as an individual.

8 SEMINI M C LAURIN I chose to sing this song because it speaks to me. It represents the journey that I am on and the future in store for me if I continue to work toward my goals. Ready to fly means to open a new chapter and try things without as much help as I needed when I was younger. The open sky above my head that no one else sees, to me means my future that no can determine but me and my God. The score of the night and the score of my life is me following my very own path instead of the paths made by others, I need to be who I am. I have the wishes from all of my friends hugs and kisses from my mom and dad, these are the people who are here in my life to support me and help me get to where I want to go. Now with my confirmation ending, a new chapter is being opened and with God's help, I am ready to fly away. Rise Up (Avery s Song) There s a feather in my hair And a wing around my neck I m ready to fly away And I ll gather wishes from all of my friends Hugs and kisses from my mom and my dad There s a feather in my hair And a wing around my neck I m ready to fly away There s an open sky above my head That no one else sees And it s calling, it s calling for me It s bright and the lights and the kites all get stuck It s brighter than anything anyone s seen And I ve got the wishes from the ground below Hugs and kisses from all that I know There s an open sky above my head That no one else sees And it s calling for me The score of the night says La-de-dah-de-dah-dah-dah-dah But the score of my life says Lah-de-dah-de-dah-dah-dah-dah-dah-oh I see cards and such of written love all there for me To leave in just a few weeks They will sit and wait to be weight To be sent away, away, away And I ve got the wishes from the letters they hold Hugs and kisses from the ones who wrote them There s a feather in my hair And a wing around my neck I m ready to fly away