KATHMANDU (UCAN) -- The usual choruses of "Alleluia" that erupt on weekends from the Assumption Church compound in Kathmandu were mixed recently with pop songs and cheering, unusual additions.

As adult members of the parish's charismatic group were having their weekend meeting on July 16 inside the church chapel, two dozen youths in the neighboring parish school hall were learning about "Youth for Christ" (YFC) in a lively fashion.

Led by four young Filipinos -- two boys wearing Nepalese caps and strumming guitars, and two girls -- the Nepalese youngsters clapped and even danced along. The animators used a laptop computer and projector to display the words to the songs and showed documentaries of YFC activities worldwide. The medium was English, which all the young Nepalese present understood.

Saturday, the weekly holiday in predominantly Hindu Nepal, is the day the main "Sunday" Mass is celebrated and various Church groups meet.

On Sunday the YFC "camp," for young people aged 13-21, continued for half a day along with two separate Kids for Christ (KFC) camps -- a senior camp for children aged 8-12 and a junior camp for children aged 4-7. Altogether more than 60 young Nepalese took part. The youth and children's movements grew out of Couples for Christ, a Catholic lay movement founded in the Philippines.

One of the Filipino animators was Bernard Arce, a full-time international KFC coordinator based in Manila. "We want to build a counterculture so we can use and live amid new technologies in a positive way," he told UCA News.

"We are offering fun, friendship, faith and the resulting true freedom," said Arce, who was given the common Nepalese nickname "Harkey" by the local youth. Accompanying the youth camps were sessions for parents and family sharing in which parents and children read "surprise" letters they wrote to each other.

For the kids it was largely fun and games. Chinky Ramirez, another full-time KFC worker based in Manila, told the story of Jesus to KFC junior campers through Biblical watercolor paintings, and taught the children how to blow bubbles. Joey Nocom, 15, currently living in Bahrain, taught songs to the senior Kids for Christ and talked about God's love. The youngest children sang songs, played with paint and made figures using marshmallows and toothpicks.

Sarah Shrestha, one of the 23 youths who participated in the YFC program, told UCA News, "I had only planned to stay for an hour, but the talks and the whole environment turned out to be far too much fun."

Sudhima Sitling, who was selected to be one of six YFC leaders in Nepal, told UCA News that she found the group "very inspiring" and that she and her fellow local youth leaders plan to meet often to sustain the inspiration.

The visiting animators gave all the local participants certificates and membership cards in the presence of Father Silas Bogati, the Couples for Christ chaplain in Nepal. Father Bogati, former parish priest of Assumption Church, currently serves as director of Caritas Nepal, the local Church's relief and development agency.

Richard D'Mello, who coordinates Couples for Christ in Nepal, Sri Lanka and the Middle East, said the movement has become a "womb to tomb" ministry. "We have Kids for Christ because the concept of only the parents getting evangelized is not enough. A set of holy parents evangelizing their children is an exception rather that a rule," the Indian layman told UCA News. "The youth have to evangelize the youth," he said.

Couples for Christ began in 1981 in Manila and has expanded to 1.5 million members in 127 countries. In 1993, it established its Family Ministries to include youth and children's groups. Youth for Christ now operates in 76 countries. The Nepalese chapter of Couples for Christ began in 2003.

Salesian Father Martin Lakra, Young Christian Students coordinator in Kathmandu, said he hoped his movement and YFC would "help and complement each other" in Nepal. He told UCA News that and eight-member team including six youths from various parishes in Nepal is busy preparing to attend the World Youth Day activities Aug. 18-21 in Cologne, Germany.

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(Accompanying photos available at here)