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See you there!  :)

You Are Loved,
The YAL Team

Let's Meet: Tony Arza of Mountain Moving Ministries

Let's Meet: Tony Arza of Mountain Moving Ministries

Describe Tony in 5 words: Sarcastic, passionate, loud, poetic, reflective

What inspired you to start Mountain Moving Ministries?

I was inspired to start Mountain Moving Ministries when I was 15 years old. I had just come to a relationship with Christ and knew that I wanted to share this new found love. That was when I decided to be a missionary and be committed to go anywhere people ask me in order to share the message of Christ and the Church. Mountain Moving Ministry reflects my own faith journey in a way as it is continually molding to whatever it is God is calling me to focus on at that time. 

If you could tell all women one thing, What would it be? I think it would be that they are loved. So often in faith we can get boggled down in all the technical things. We think of our journey toward Jesus as avoiding sin and being a "good" person. But the reality is we are all broken and we all need this Divine Lover. Knowing that you are loved as a woman is so important, I believe every girl wants this, to know that she is worth being loved. And many times, that question goes unanswered by their fathers and so they seek other men to tell them that they are worth loving. Maybe the men in your life made you feel like you had to meet certain expectations or that you were only good enough if you did certain things or didn't do certain things. The reality is, we are all broken, every single girl on this planet is broken she is imperfect, and the world wants us to refuse to accept this, the world and at times ill advise people of faith tell us we have to be perfect. We have so many voices which say you will only be loved "IF" or you are only worth loving "WHEN". This causes each of us to develop a feeling of deep insecurity and a fear that if people knew we weren't perfect we wouldn't be loved but you are. In fact, not only will you be loved you are loved. That is why this message that you are loved is so vital for women today because it answers the longing they have for acceptance and counteracts their fear of rejection. If women today hope to live a life of peace and joy they must accept this love, and ultimately they must accept themselves. Life is full of much heart ache and this is not the solution to every problem but this self-acceptance and acceptance of God's Love promises a haven of security and a garden of intimacy. The journey toward a life of value and a life of love is through this road of Acceptance.  Maybe you are someone who strives to live a faithful life as a Christian and you very rarely fall into sin, and you say many prayers each day do all the "right" things. This is wonderful but if on the day you fail and you sin and you don't pray because you got busy do you still have peace. Are you still secure in the love of God. Because we can't make "God's love" like the "worlds love" and think we can earn it. Or that God has a standard by which he judges those who are more worth His love and those who aren't  No, He doesn't, He loves you always at every moment and in order to accept His love and the love of anyone else in our lives we must accept ourselves. As women, you must love yourself not based on any "thing" not on something tangible or external it must be a total acceptance of all your faults and sins because Jesus accepts us with our Sins and thus we must learn to accept ourselves. This path to self acceptance is immensely difficult. Yet, I think it is so quickly overlooked and that's why I think it is the one thing I want all women to know, because their journey toward lives of love and happiness all begins within their very hearts .Some times the hardest person to love and accept is ourselves, but only in doing this will we allow the love of Jesus to flow into our lives. 

Something I found that your always closing and opening up conversations is "Jesus Loves You." How do you find people's reactions to this? Haha. This is a great question cause I get many different responses to this. I usually get an awkward stare at first because most people don't really know how to respond. Some say thank you others say you too and on a few occasions I get "I don't believe in Jesus". I always try to be loving and in my love for the people who say they don't believe I just all the more emphatically say "it's ok, well... he still loves you." Sometimes I get people who say at my school you don't need to tell Christians that we all already know he loves us. But my response to them is this- if we really knew that Jesus loves us we would have changed the world a long time ago. Just turn on the television and you will see that clearly we as Christians have not allowed the depth of this reality to totally consume our hearts, because if we did we wouldn't have to worry about trying to convert people, they would be converted by the joy and peace comes from a true knowledge and acceptance of the love of Jesus.

What is your favorite way to unwind from a busy week? I love to sit in my room and play guitar. I personally love to write songs, I've even recorded some of the stuff I've written. Nothing brings me more peace than allowing my heart to be put into words and allowing those words to meet the emotional nature of whichever chords I'm playing. Singing to Jesus or about the sufferings of this life is a great way to learn to embrace the reality of hardship in this world and unite it to Christ on the Cross.

Click this to see Tony in action at a retreat in women's session!

What can we soon expect from Tony Arza and Mountain Moving Ministries? 

Soon you can expect a new series of podcast and God willing a reboot of the website-tonyarza.com.  We will most definitely keep speaking wherever the ask us to and be sure to Share the healing message of the Gospel with everyone we encounter. But at the end of the day I really don't know what is in store for me and my ministry because really my life and my ministry belongs to Jesus. It will be around for as long as he wills it and when he doesn't it too will fade away. For I only started this ministry for Jesus and to do His will and as he reveals more and more to me I will be sure to respond no matter what the cost.  

 Tony Arza is a 22 year old college student who currently is attending Franciscan University. He had a conversion very early on in His life, and at the age of 15 he started Mountain Moving Ministries. Tony has traveled to several continents including Africa, Australia and Europe. After doing mission work overseas he develop a tremendous love for mission work here in the United States of America and decided to focus his ministry closer to home. He now speaks at Church retreats around the country. He looks forward to doing much more as time goes on including a more technologically  friendly ministry helping him achieve his goal to reach as many people as possible.

*Thank you for stopping by The You Are Loved Campaign, Tony! We look forward to seeing great things come from your ministry.*

The Modeste Project: And That's All My Hat Has to Say About That

 Hat& Sweater: Michael Kors, Scarf: Gap Skirt: Foxy's in Kilmarnock, Boots: Macy's

"Modesty Is NOT A Set Of Rules" Love, Hillary May

Ladies,

I get tired of the concept of Fashion Rules, i.e. Fashion Restrictions. Don’t wear brown with black? Well, why not? I assure you that I can look very chic in my brown dress pants with a black blouse and a colorful scarf. No one has ever looked at me and informed me that I do not look good because of my color mixing. In fact, no one is ever going to look at you and tell you that you do not match if you are confident and rocking your outfit. So I get tired of Fashion Rules. White is fine in the winter; it can even be refreshing.

But what about those other Fashion Rules? Those ones you worry over when you want to make sure your wardrobe is modest? How do I feel about those? Well, I’ll tell you the truth: I don’t like those either. Here are some examples:

No strapless tops.

No skirts more than three inches above the knee.

No tight jeans.

I do not like these rules for modesty. They are well-meaning. They are intended to help women make good decisions. However, it is my opinion that they are misguided. I am not saying you shouldn't do the mirror test to determine whether or not your blouse is covering you appropriately, and I am certainly not saying that you should stop doing contortions in the dressing room in order to see if you really can move in that skirt before buying it. What I’m saying is that we need to stop thinking of modesty as a series of rules. If we see it in terms of rules, we see it in terms of “cannots,” and we resent it. If we tell ourselves “No Strapless Tops,” we are sad when we see that gorgeous blouse that would be so flattering on us but can’t buy it. We resent having a do-not list.

I think we have to think of modesty differently, more openly. We’re fierce, gorgeous, independent women, and we want to be free to dress how we want because – and this is key – we WANT to be modest. We’re daughters of the King, and we have important things to do every day. We’re spreading love and warmth and laughter and beauty throughout the world, and we want to have a wardrobe that reflects that. If you are drawn to a strapless top, I trust that you want to make it a great addition to your wardrobe. Maybe you are confident you can pair it with long pants and flats to balance the bare shoulders. Maybe you want to wear it with a short-sleeved cardigan and fitted knee-length jean shorts (if you do not own a pair of those, I strongly recommend you get one. They’re so versatile. But I digress…) As for those tight skinny jeans, maybe you want to wear them with that gorgeous tunic hanging in your closet, and that skirt that is four inches above the knee might look perfect with a sweater, knit tights, and flat boots

However you envision the pieces that speak to you in your wardrobe, I trust that you are envisioning them in a way that will make you look beautiful and wholesome. Trust your loving heart; it will guide you better than an arbitrary rule, and it will help you honor Him without leading you to mistakenly think of modesty as a series of “do nots.”

Modesty should be empowering and exciting, not restricting, and if we think of it as our personal style adventure, we will never resent it.

And we will look as fabulous as we are. Enough said.

Love,

Your Modesty-Loving Sister

Hillary May

"Hillary May is a proud graduate of Virginia Tech and is currently pursuing a master's in Curriculum and Instruction at the College of William and Mary. Her days are full of God, family, friends, passion, children, and rescue animals, and she would not have it any other way."

The Modeste Project: I'm in the Fall Club now

boots:steve madden, Jeans: F21, brown leather jacket: Roxy, scarf: Gap, jewelery: my own

Photography: Sarah Wohleking

"What I Will Never Be Afraid to Tell You" By Bianca Wohleking

Ta...DA! Womp.  I wasn't going to share the photos today because they are not what I had in my head of what the very first fashion post for The You Are Loved Campaign was going to be. So I’m sitting at me desk saying that exact sentence in my head and then I pretty much yelled at myself ( you have permission to picture that image) and said, “ What? What is anything in this life that we have planned. God doesn't work that way. It’s His plan, not ours..”

            I had originally planned on taking these yesterday but my brother had a soccer game about an hour out of town and then my family went out to eat over there, and then we stopped at a few places along the way. By the time we got home my sister and I had planned to watch a movie. So time just went so fast and before you know the day was over... .. Today, I woke up saying today is the day. It is POURING in Virginia, today. Yet, I still wanted to do this , why not? Logic. So I turn on my camera, sort of, it decides not to work for anything. I tried pleads, begging, offering of cupcakes- nothing. So we go home and decide to use my brother’s camera. That one doesn't want to comply as well.  Okay, well, fine. What do we do now? Mind, that it’s drizzling but not really anything to worry about. So, I run upstairs and grab my iPod Touch and turn it on. It’s on 20%. My sister grabs it and begins snapping then.. boom it falls straight to the ground, narrowly escaping a puddle. Haha, What?? Really?? She picks it up and it’s fine and then she realizes the last pictures she had taken are now gone. I laugh and as I laugh it starts to pour. She snaps two then, Sarah says " Uh, it just died." Just as she says this the rain falls down. So these are the only two photos that were taken today. I thought, “Why is everything that could be going wrong, going wrong?”

Yes I was a little disappointed… but then I thought- 

“But he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me." 

             I will eventually take better pictures and that will be fine but what is that portraying? That life is perfect? That I do everything correctly the first time? That is the farthest thing from the truth. I can trip on air, I sometimes still need my mom to get my clothes out for events because I don’t even know where to start, and 5 days of the week the most glitzy thing on me is my sparkle nail polish. The rest of me says shirt, shorts, and sneakers. No I lied to you, Now that’s it’s a bit colder it will be hoodie, shorts and sneakers. So, I will never be afraid to tell you of my weaknesses, of the days when everything goes wrong, of the days where I literally just come to my room, turn out the lights, make hot chocolate, and blast Hillsong United to bring me back to the place of grace.  I can’t stand going to fashion websites that just have all this fluff and no realness its like, “You get dressed up everyday? What about the days you just want to go out walking? You cannot wear heels for that. Or when you want to play soccer with your siblings, or roll on the floor with your dog, or get down barefoot before Our Lord and tell Him He is everything? It’s extremely hard to do that dressed up." So that will never be MY everyday. So just remember this first fashion post when you see the others.  The person running this site is just like you. I can't say I will do everything perfectly. Yet, I can promise one perfection. I will hand to you perfect Truth.  A Truth that was passed on throughout the centuries and was taught to me. A Truth that brings light into our dark and confusing world. A Truth that can cut through the hurt and pain in our lives and make us whole again. A Truth that brings us to God. Jesus. That is what this is ALL about. And Jesus is who this site is about.

Remember : “But he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me” 2 Corinthians 12:9

By the way, Welcome to the fashion series for YAL, “The Modeste Project” A project it is ;)

If You Fly With Crows by Spencer Pruett

If You Fly With Crows…

            Every year, on the first day of school, my father always tells me: “If you fly with crows, you’ll be shot at.” Meaning I need to watch out for who I associate myself with. Even if I am not doing anything wrong, but my friends are, I will be branded as a troublemaker. Needless to say, my father is a little old fashioned. He despises new age things like Facebook, Twitter, essentially anything to do with technology, and many of the social ideas that seem to be prominent now, including how to treat women. When it comes to chivalry, my father is the Gold Standard. Some have told me that chivalry is dead; I tell them they are wrong. But what scares me is that chivalry is dying.

            I have many female friends, most of whom do not have older brothers (or brothers in general). So, me being me, I always take the role of “older brother.”  One of my close female friends (let’s name her Jane) is in a relationship with a guy that I do not approve of (let’s name him John). I always try to find the good in people, and this guy blows every chance he has to prove to me he isn’t completely worthless. Jane has complained to me on more than one occasion about John, and I finally decided to tell her just how much I dislike John, and remind her of all of the complaints she has made to me about him. I concluded my arguments with her by saying: “He’s just no good for you.” Much to my surprise, she said: “I know.” She actually agreed that she should not be in this harmful relationship (no, not physically harmful. Believe me I would have stepped in much earlier if it were). I asked why she was still with him, her exact words to me were: “Because it’s nice to not wear the pants in the relationship for once.”

            She goes on to explain how in previous relationships she would initiate conversation and plan dates, and now she doesn’t have to. This is the only reason she is still dating John, and to be honest, it makes me upset. It makes me upset that she does not see her worth. Sadly, she is not my only female friend in a situation like this. Fortunately, I have no male friends in this sort of situation. Believe it or not, not all men are jerks like John (I have many other words to describe John, but “jerk” will work for now). But this idea does not seem to be accepted by our society. The top-selling book in America currently happens to be Fifty Shades of Grey[1]. The number 2 and 3 spots go to Fifty Shades Darker and Fifty Shades Freed respectively. For those of you who don’t know, Fifty Shades of Grey is the first book of a trilogy involving a young woman and a wealthy businessman who is in to BDSM (Bondage/Dominance/Sadism/Masochism).[2] The “D” part is what I’ll focus on for a moment. It would seem that women who don’t have much respect for themselves will allow the man to be Dominant, not always going so far as the book does, but still not promoting a healthy relationship.

            Much to my dismay, my friend Jane has lost respect for herself. It may be because she doesn’t believe she is beautiful, smart, or just good in general. And it honestly makes me sad.

            More than once you have more than likely heard that women need to raise their standards in the men they choose to enter a relationship with. I recently heard a friend of mine talking about an Apologist who says that as men, we need to raise our standards. I bring this up because, as a man, I would not choose my friend Jane to be my girlfriend, or, subsequently, my wife. This is because she does not respect herself, and that is obvious when she continues this harmful relationship with John.

            So, as a man, here is my plea to the women who follow The You Are Loved Campaign: Respect yourself and help all those you see respect themselves. You are worth more than your body, and don’t let anyone, man or woman, tell you different. Whenever you question this, remember this: You Are Loved, and don’t fly with crows.

---

[1] http://www.amazon.com/best-sellers-of-2012-for-books

[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fifty_Shades_of_Grey

 Spencer Pruett is a strong Catholic and has been very active in Youth Ministry for the past four years. He is currently studying mathematics at Bakersfield College. Spencer also plans on joining the United States Marine Corps, joining the Deaconate, and staying involved with the You Are Loved Campaign and Youth Ministry for as long as God continues to bless him with the opportunity to do so.