I remember the day I really became a youth minister. It was a cool, fall morning in Wisconsin, and as I rolled out of bed at 11:45 AM and like a zombie walked toward my closet, my heavy eyes searched for some daily attire. I pulled out a t-shirt.
“Come Alive – Retreat 2011.” And then another, “Rooted – Summer Camp 2009.”
A third retreat, “Jesus is a friend of mine” – Youth Group 1997.” And then a fourth, fifth, and sixth.
It had officially happened; the volume of retreat shirts had surpassed my supply of “normal people clothing.” To be honest, I don’t know what happened to my other t-shirts – it was like overnight my retreat shirt from 2007 had witnessed to my other clothing about Jesus and convinced them to convert to poorly designed, 50/50 polyester blend, covered in Christian catch-phrases.
See, as a youth minister, I took several trips with teens during the year and they all necessitated a t-shirt. Not only do matching t-shirts help you keep track of the teens, but you also get to judge how “cool” or “lame” other groups’ t-shirts are in comparison to yours. As a bonus, you got a free t-shirt to keep for the next 15 years. I looked at it as my parish budget’s way of “clothing the naked.”
Over the years those t-shirts stacked up. Thankfully, as a youth minister nobody expected me to ever dress up for work, so I could totally rock the “youth group t-shirt with cargo shorts” look day in and day out. People just expected that I was dressed that way in case an ultimate Frisbee game broke out and I needed to go do some ministry.
Even if your wardrobe doesn’t consist entirely of t-shirts that recall memories of youth group days gone by, I bet you at least have a few. And I bet sometimes, on a cold Saturday morning, you put one of those shirts on and say, “Shine Jesus Shine ‘95 – one of the best.”
Wear it proudly – you’re in good company.
Question:
What is does your favorite youth group/retreat t-shirt say?
Don’t let your Faith Fizzle…take it to the hizzle (with a drawing of our Church) It’s epic!
The hilarious thing about reading this, I’m currently wearing a shirt from a youth group in the Diocese with a picture of a light bulb and a salt shaker with the tag “Be these.”
We use retreat t-shirts to cover the ceiling tiles in the youth office., practical and keeps my closet cleaner. We also made a bunch into throw pillows to keep around the office. Recently, Austin had an eco-event where they made grocery bags out of old t-shirts. I’m thinking it will be our next fundraising project!
Betsy – that is a fantastic idea! T-shirt ceiling tiles – I love it.
My three favs (in no particular order):
They Will Know We Are Christians By Our T-shirts
Heavy Drinker (with John 6:36 on the back)
My Mom’s A Virgin (with a picture of Mary on the back)
At one point we had a youth minister (who shall remain nameless) who was the king of the “edgy” retreat shirt
I LOVE ALL OF THESE!!!
AWESOME, Kristen! HAHAHA love it. My coworker here at CFJ sent me the link to this blog because yesterday (in a rare t-shirt moment) I was wearing Life is Good (Marianist LIFE – Gross Catholic High School) and mentioning how Gross Catholic always cracks me up even though it’s a dumb joke.
Hope all is well in LT world!
Ditto on Kristin’s
“My Mom’s a Virgin”
But we can’t forget
“Who you say that I am” (front) – “idk, my bff jc”(back)
My most unexplainable one says “Rejected” across the front. I have since forgotten the meaning, and unfortunately, the back is all in Greek… Lots of unanswered questions with that one.
One year, our shirts were supposed to say “gotta be” on the front and “Catholic” on the back. The company made an unfortunate misprint on the front so we all became “wannabe”s.
hahaha that is so great! wannabe catholic…:D
You bring back good memories with this blog! You’re in my prayers! We all miss you, Joel. My fav retreat shirt would prob be my first – [pray] with the “Our Father” on the back
I found some good ideas on pinterest on how to turn t-shirts into vests and quilts. I’ve still got some of my shirts from when I was a teen. It maaay be time to say good-bye to those. I guess.
But my favorite is one from Steubie on the Bayou that has a pic of Mama Mary on the Back and says “Your Mom” beneath her. Love that one.
I have a few I still love.
“Heavy Drinker” (Kristin mentioned it above)
“Jesus is my superhero”
“Catholic”
Was the “Catholic” one written out like “Coca-Cola?” Those are fantastic.
Ours only changes color. “I <3 being Catholic." It is tradition. My youth minister say that we are "known for it" at Steubenville West.
I actually don't have one yet, having just moved here and become a Freshman at the same time.
Ah, blog post brings back memories and describes my closet so well. I have all the same t-shirts! Plus, we broke the mold one year and did my favorite t-shirt: “Eucharist: Est. 33 AD”
Deborah
“I am not a Parrot” Steubenville Conference 4 years ago. That was the name of the theme song. The back of the shirt featured a caricature of our youth minster as a Pirate holding a dead parrot. Needless to say we won the conference.
I always measured my t-shirt design success at Steubenville based on the amount of requests I received from other groups to “trade” shirts. I figured if at least four people approached me to compliment the shirt and ask if we had “extras” there were at least, like, 1,000 more who wanted to ask…at least, that’s an estimation.
Our latest retreat tee says:
Livin on the EDGE (the Edge logo tilted) on the front
Hangin out at St. Matthew (with a graphic of a rock wall climber) on the back
We’re doing rock walls & a ropes course for the day.
One of my favorites was from our Parish Picnic mud volleyball:
LIFE TEEN MUD VOLLEYBALL
where getting dirty is good, clean fun
With 13 years of youth ministry and not being a t-shirt wearer, I should have kept all mine to make a quilt!
When I was a teen, we had shirts that said: “BAHHHHHH” on the front… and on the back it said, “Mary had a little Lamb.”
Our Life Teen shirt last year has “Got Life” and then “They devoted themselves to the teaching of the apostles and to the communal life, to the breaking of the bread and to the prayers” Acts 2:42
I will be leaving for the convent in 2.5 months and am planning on taking all of my retreat and life teen shirts and turning them into a Catholic T-shirt blanket…I hear t-shirts and habits are not always the best of friends.
When were you in my closet?? This is a bit scary! This describes my closet to a T!
As far as my favorite shirt… there are many, but one stands out above the others. Steubenville East 1999 (I think)
front “Excuse me but…”
back “You’ve got a little Steubenville on your face!”
they were so well liked Bob Rice asked for one, the teen who had coined the phrase was ecstatic!
Joel…’97? Umm, weren’t you like in 5th grade or maybe even younger?
To date I’ve collected 78+ YM shirts from youth ministry events.. I’ve started quilting them (Yeah old school
and bring them to picnik lunch’s when I go into the highschools. Teens really like them and we can talk about all the different events…
[...] pulled on a retreat t-shirt, gym shorts, and a baseball hat and wiped away the eye boogers that had developed during my three [...]
The “my mom’s a virgin” shirt got in trouble with the principal in high school- it was a little too edge-y for him.
My most recent one is from SHINE Ministries, and for their remake of the Hunger Games (the theme for the summer) , their shirt has a Dove, the Eucharist, and flames on it, and its pretty epic.
[...] do not make a lot of money. In fact, we’ve even been known to stock our wardrobe with 15-year-old retreat t-shirts just to keep us clothed. And yet, somehow most of us have an iPhone. Go [...]