CRANBERRY TWP - Often, getting a teen into church is not an easy job. But the St. Ferdinand Roman Catholic Church youth group, and the adults who power the logistics of making it a destination of choice, seem to have found a way.

And for a number of the adults involved in the program, it's a turnabout.

"I know people who are active with our teens who were here as kids themselves," said Andrea Wheeler, youth ministry coordinator at the church.

Adults in the program belong to either the Parents for Life or Core team. Parents for Life usually have children in the Life Teen program while CORE members do not, allowing teens to speak more freely "without Mom sitting there," said Marsha Byrum, youth ministry assistant coordinator for the Parents for Life adult group. Byrum said the CORE adults seem less like parental figures and for that reason are sometimes more approachable.

"We do it all in the Life Teen Program," said Wheeler of the educational and social program that attracts a couple of hundred kids in the hard-sell age.

"My teen never says 'Do I have to go?' and I know what it's like to have kids that didn't want to go" said Byrum.

The teen Mass on Sunday evenings is also a big draw, with contemporary Christian music provided by the Invincible Spirit band, teen lectors and gift carriers.

Afterward, from 7 to 9 p.m., teens congregate in Oldenski Hall for talk and planning sessions for service projects and social events.

Service projects span the Fall Ball for resident seniors at Passavant Center North, Thanksgiving visits to residents at Holy Family Institute and collecting items for a backpack project at Christmas in which the satchels are filled with gift items and given to needy children.

Social events are the usual outings appealing to teens, such as a picnic or a trip to Sandcastle

Waterpark

in Pittsburgh.

"My whole life growing up, I've been going to church but the music brought me to Life Teen," said Alana Byrum, an 11th grader at Vincentian Academy and a member of three years standing in the program. "(Life Teen) gives you an insight to life you won't get in school. It's also an escape from your everyday normal things."

Alana Byrum serves as a "young apostle" and leader for several of Life Teen's service projects including work with Habitat for Humanity, serving in a soup kitchen and taking part in the Living Stations, one of the group's major undertakings.

"Starting in January, about 80 teens and 35 adults begin rehearsing the Living Stations, a re-enactment of the life, death and Resurrection of Jesus," said Wheeler.

The production includes students in costume as well as light and sound technicians and readers.

"During the Living Stations, the kids are gone from 2 to 10 p.m. every week," said Marsha Byrum. "Every time, after the prayer service, people come up and tell you how much it meant to them, then you know it's worth it," said her daughter, Alana.

During Lent, the group travels to other churches to put on the show. They'll be travelling for the second year in a row to a church in West Virginia. The show's only publicity is "word of mouth, and we typically will do a church only two years in a row," said Wheeler. The group's final staging is on Good Friday at St. Ferdinand.