THE chaplain to Marist Youth Care in Sydney, Br Desmond Murphy, says today’s youth have much more difficult problems than past generations.
Br Murphy spoke with The Leader during a visit to Brisbane late last month.
Marist Youth Care, which was launched on August 15 at the Blacktown Workers’ Club in Sydney, was formerly known as Marist Community Services.
Br Murphy said the name change reflected the organisation’s need to accentuate its focus on youth and their needs in light of founder Marcellin Champagnat’s philosophies.
He said the group was one of a few organisations throughout Australia offering residential facilities for youth with ‘challenging behaviour’.
Br Murphy said the greatest problem facing today’s youth was the breakdown in family.
‘It’s the upheaval in families – the term they use these days is dysfunctionalism – and what we do at Marist Youth Care is all about family restoration.
‘The state of society in general, with its shifting priorities and the number of youth who haven’t got family support, makes it much more difficult for them to cope with the many pressures and problems they face.’
He said as well as providing short and medium-term residential programs aimed at integrating problem youth back into their families, Marist Youth Care has also started a program called school conferencing.
‘Schools just don’t know how to handle these kids with very challenging behaviour, and we get all the parties together with a trained facilitator to try and restore the relationship, provide an opportunity for the student to understand the harm that has occurred, and who has been affected.’
Br Murphy said family was the crucial factor for young people.
‘We take a lot of the cases that no one else can deal with and some of these young people have had horrendous lives. They have been abused, they have been tortured. There is nothing for them to go back to but they have almost a yearning for family.
‘One example was a young fellow who was with us a couple of years ago. He came from a pretty bad background but he still hung on to his mum, and he fell apart when she didn’t come down for his birthday. We had sent tickets and organised
everything for her and she didn’t show, and he just went to pieces. No matter how bad things are, there is still that need for family.’
Br Murphy said while it was difficult to judge success rates because of a lack of specific data, Marist Youth Care was full of stories of inspiration.
‘We had a young girl who came to us and we were told ‘if you can keep her alive you’re doing well’.
‘She had problems of self-mutilation and attempted suicide. But after we’d had this girl for a couple of years she moved to Queensland, got herself a job, a steady boyfriend and celebrated her 18th birthday. Now we can’t say that she won’t have problems again some time in the future, but at the moment she is doing well.’
For more information about Marist Youth Care, phone (02) 9671 7688.
