The Wind Blows Where It Wills (BJEP020)

The Wind Blows Where It Wills (John 3:8)

A few years ago, a young Jesus Youth leader from outside Kerala sat beside me after a session and asked me a question I have been asked many times. "Edward, sir," she said, "how did it all begin? How did something so specific — this particular way of being young and Catholic — become what it is today?" I smiled because I knew the honest answer was not a single story but many, woven together over decades by a wind that blows where it wills.

Let me try to tell you at least part of that story.

There is a passage in Ezekiel — the forty-seventh chapter — that I have returned to again and again over the years whenever I try to make sense of how movements grow. The prophet describes a small spring of water trickling out from the right side of the temple. A man walks ahead of him with a measuring cord. With each measured stage, the trickle deepens. First ankle-deep, then knee-deep, then waist-deep, until it becomes a river that cannot be crossed — a river that transforms everything around it. I do not think I have ever found a more accurate picture of what I have witnessed in my own lifetime.

The wave of renewal that would eventually reshape Catholic life in Kerala arrived from Bombay in 1976. In June of that year, programs were organized in Kochi and Kozhikode, and something changed. I remember the clarity in the room — the sense that a fresh and joyful way of living the faith was not only possible but actually present and available. A large number of people, especially in Kochi, began to understand this spirituality with a new seriousness. What gave that beginning its staying power was the prayerful, nurturing involvement of two Spanish Carmelite priests whose combination of spiritual maturity and genuine joy established not just enthusiasm but continuity of leadership. A good beginning, like the spring from the threshold of the temple, is never small. It is simply waiting to grow.

Growth, however, rarely follows a straight line. It is shaped by unexpected letters, unexpected challenges, and unexpected moments of waiting.

In February 1978, the first Renewal leadership gathering took place — a quiet but important step in ensuring that what had begun was properly accompanied. Then, in May that year, the then-Chairman of the National Service Committee wrote a letter. It was not a dramatic letter; it simply observed that since leadership among young people already existed in Kerala, the natural next step was to organize a youth gathering. From that letter, a first youth team took shape. And from that team came a youth convention, held in December — carefully prepared, deeply anticipated.

Then, in September 1981, came one of those moments that I can only describe as a grace-filled provocation. A new national chairman issued a challenge that still rings in my ears: the youth of this era needed to discover a distinctive spirituality and a distinctive style of engagement. It was the kind of challenge that either paralyzes a group or galvanizes it. By God's grace, it galvanized. A new youth committee was formed. Comprehensive, unhurried exploratory discussions followed. A new framework of action emerged. Innovative training initiatives were launched. And out of all of this came the 'First Line' leadership team — a group of young people who had now taken ownership of a vision that was no longer borrowed from anywhere else.

But we still needed a name. We still needed a banner — something visible to gather around. That moment came not from within the movement, but from outside it. Pope John Paul II, following a United Nations initiative, declared an International Youth Year. That declaration became the occasion for this growing movement to step into the light with a clear and public identity. The 1985 conference was the result — and from that point onward, the trickle that had begun in 1976 became what Ezekiel's prophet had seen in his vision: an expanding, deepening river. Ministries. Formation programs. Diverse groups. Varied conferences. And, year by year, a growing clarity about what made this movement distinctively itself.

"The wind blows where it wills," Jesus told Nicodemus. "You hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it is going." I think of that verse often when I look back at the journey I have tried to sketch here. Nobody planned most of what happened. Nobody sat in a room in 1976 and said, "In nine years' time, we will have a movement with a name and a banner and leadership teams across Kerala." The Spirit blew, and people listened, and they were willing to be moved.

Today, Jesus Youth has reached many nations. It has become a presence in many spheres of life. And I am often asked — by curious leaders, by young people writing dissertations, by journalists who cannot quite categorize us — how this particular approach came to be. How did something so specific grow in this particular soil? The purpose of these articles is to try to answer that question honestly, from the inside — not as a historian looking at events from a distance, but as someone who was there, watching the water rise.

For further reflection:

1. The spring in Ezekiel's vision begins as a trickle before becoming a river. Can you identify a moment in your own faith journey when something small became the seed of something much larger?

2. The 1981 challenge called young people to discover "a distinctive spirituality and a distinctive style of engagement." What do you understand to be distinctive about Jesus Youth's spirituality today?

3. Pope John Paul II's declaration of an International Youth Year became an unexpected occasion of growth for the movement. How do you discern which external events or challenges are invitations of the Spirit and which are simply distractions?

4. "The wind blows where it wills." How does your group or community create space for the Holy Spirit to lead, rather than simply executing plans already made?