Residents of Salt Lake City were met with a unique sight during the first week of January as thousands of young Catholics from across the country, many with rosaries in hand, made their way around the city, filling restaurants with laughter and prayer. Instead of finding hipsters at the downtown coffee shops, locals met Dominican sisters enjoying lattes and groups of young men and women praying the Divine Mercy Chaplet around the city center. On New Year’s Eve, 40 college-age students from the Diocese of Fort Wayne-South Bend traveled to Salt Lake City for the largest annual gathering of young adult Catholics in the world. The SEEK Conference, which took place at the Salt Palace Convention Center, hosted five days of Mass, adoration, and various talks for young people by prominent Catholic speakers. Students crowd in front of the stage and await the next speaker at the SEEK Conference in Salt Lake City on Thursday, January 2. SEEK is an anual conference for college-aged Catholics hosted by the young ministry apostolate FOCUS. The Diocese of Fort Wayne-South Bend sponsored students from a variety of universities to attend the event, including Purdue University, the University of Saint Francis, Trine University, Manchester University, Purdue University Fort Wayne, and others. The conference, organized by FOCUS (Fellowship of Catholic University Students), brought many of the world’s most prominent Catholic speakers together to form, inform, and inspire the youth of the Church. Accompanied by Father Ryan Timossi, pastor of St. Patrick Church in Ligonier, and Father Sam Anderson, parochial vicar of St. Vincent de Paul Church in Elkhart, and later joined at the conference by other diocesan priests – Father Jake Schneider, Father Daniel Koehl, and Father Dennis DiBenedetto – the 40 students boarded their flights eager to attend. Walking through the airport with two priests in cassocks enlivened the group, which was proud to show that they were a part of the Church. The conference gave many opportunities for prayer and reflection, but also for sightseeing with their fellow Catholics.    On the first day in Salt Lake City, Nick and Jack Mills, brothers and students at Purdue University Fort Wayne, especially enjoyed visiting the city’s Cathedral of the Madeleine and riding electric scooters with Father Timossi on the way to the conference. Maddy Bryan, a student at the University of Saint Francis, noted the sense of normalcy for those attending the conference who strive to proudly live their faith. “It’s such a Catholic environment. You see all the priests, brothers, and sisters everywhere. It’s not weird to see them,” she said. Bruce D’Rosa, also a student at Purdue University Fort Wayne, said that having the opportunity to pray with thousands of his Catholic peers deeply impacted his faith life. “Walking into SEEK is crazy,” he told Today’s Catholic. “There are literally 20,000 people who are the same as you – they believe in the same things and also struggle in the same ways as you,” he said. A ‘Closeness’ Like Never Before After attending talks and prayer sessions at the conference, D’Rosa said he felt like he truly belonged with his fellow Catholics, in the face of difficulties in the past.    “Being Catholic is controversial in today’s world,” he said. “I have plenty of friends who are not Catholic and say it’s the most controversial thing about me.” At SEEK, friendships formed through a shared belief. “At the conference, I was able to see people similar to me, who want to support me and care for me. There is no controversy. We mesh together, and there isn’t that big difference,” D’Rosa said. D’Rosa said he was struck by a newfound sense of community.  ‘When it comes to Catholicism, there is an immediate closeness when someone comes up to you and says ‘hello,’ because you believe in the same things,” D’Rosa shared, adding that “these [young adult Catholics] are truly my people. … I’m with these people. They are basically a part of who I am in the Church.” He shared that the conference brought “closeness with others,” which he had never felt before, even influencing his plans for the summer. He now desires to attend a retreat for young adults in the diocese, Summit Awakening, in the wake of the newfound sense of togetherness he discovered at SEEK. Called to Be a ‘Soldier’ After the conference, D’Rosa came to the conclusion he ought to live his faith more consistently. Meditating on the talks given directly to young men, he realized, “You’re called by God to be a soldier not a couch potato. Having separate talks really helped me relate even more to those around me,” he told Today’s Catholic. Catholic speakers urged young people to find friends who bring them closer to Christ.  “I need good Catholic male friends to grow, and I really need male friends to hold me accountable. I need them to hold me to higher standards as I continue in my journey.” This helps when practicing the faith does not always “feel” nice, D’Rosa added. “The reality is, you are not always going to ‘feel’ in your faith. You should not fall in love with that feeling of, ‘Oh, I feel moved,’” D’Rosa said. “At a point, in almost a manly way, you just say, ‘OK, I’m doing this because Jesus asked me to. I don’t care how I feel right now. I don’t care if I don’t have a warm feeling. Jesus asked me to pray and give to the poor, so I will do it,’” he said. SEEK allowed D’Rosa to think about his faith, develop new friendships, and strive for holiness in a new way. “Going to the conference, I realized I don’t know things. I assumed I knew Christ. I assumed I knew how to pray, but then when I got there, I didn’t know.” In the end, D’Rosa said attending the SEEK Conference showed him a way of living through prayer and fellowship that does not have to stay in Utah. Beginning the second semester of his sophomore year, he said he desires to continue that newfound closeness with other faithful Catholics in Fort Wayne. Clare Hildebrandt is a staff reporter for Today’s Catholic. The post Young Adults Find Sense of Community at SEEK25 appeared first on Today's Catholic.