Photo Provided by Emma Muse ’26

Emma Muse ’26, Delilah Moos ’26 and Izzy Brule ’26 learned so much about representation and voicing their views!

About two weeks ago, seniors Emma Muse, Delilah Moos and Izzy Brule, accompanied by Mrs. Flati, traveled to Sacramento to participate in Laudato Si Advocacy Summit which allowed them to talk about advocacy and public witness rooted in Catholic teaching. With over 300 youth, bishops and elected officials, the seniors and other students from other schools participated in workshops to prepare for the next day. For some context, Laudato Si is the title of Pope Francis’ encyclical that talked about the importance of caring for the earth.

The participants then went to a nearby park to hear student testimonies and about the importance of the youth to lobby for their beliefs. At the capital, everyone broke up into assigned groups to talk to people who worked with their representatives. Here, they had the chance to discuss any issues that are important to them in their groups. The event focused on commitment to environmental stewardship and human dignity.

For Emma, the meetings demonstrated the importance of expressing your beliefs: “I loved having the meetings with our legislators because it showed me how important it is to stand up for my beliefs/rights and how much fun it could be as well.” Not only did students get the opportunity to share their perspective, but they also learned about bills, political arguments and voicing concerns to representatives.

Something that stuck out to Izzy was “the fact that as a registered voter and citizen, I was able to actually appeal to my representatives which made me feel that I was actually making an impact on my government and enacting the change I want to see in our state.” The event allowed students to see how valuable their voices can be. Hopefully, our seniors took some important insights from this experience.

As seniors share why they think events like this are important, Izzy explained, “The event was important because as a young person who is just getting to the age I can vote, it was important for me to see how I as an individual can have an impact on my government. I feel a lot of young people don’t vote and/or don’t speak up about issues they have with the government because they feel their voice will not be heard, but that’s not true.” Hopefully, our seniors were able to gain a better understanding of how their voices can and will be heard. If you want to learn more about the event or Laudato Si, you can visit this website or read this PDF of Laudato Si!