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About Totus Tuus

What is Totus Tuus?

TOTUS TUUS (Latin for Totally Yours) is a fun and energetic parish based summer catechetical program for both grade school age children and middle and high school youth. TOTUS TUUS gathers together college students and seminarians from across the United States onto teaching teams of four in order to train them and send them out on the road to spread the Good News of Jesus Christ in various participating parishes throughout the Archdiocese of Cincinnati. The missionaries’ youthfulness, energy, and ability to witness to the Faith make them particularly effective with children and young adults.

The methodology, structure, content, and enthusiasm of Totus Tuus is concerned not only with teaching the Faith, but also igniting the hearts of the team members and the young people they encounter. The result has been the formation of young adults who continue to dedicate themselves to the Church’s mission of evangelization along with many vocations to the priesthood and religious life.

Our Mission

The mission of Totus Tuus is to inspire in young people a true longing for holiness, a deep desire for daily conversion and an openness to their vocation by the constant challenge to give themselves entirely to Christ through Mary and by continually strengthening their prayer lives in imitation of Her.

Our Motivation

Totus Tuus, a Latin phrase meaning “Totally Yours,” was the motto of Pope Saint John Paul II. Taken from St. Louis de Montfort’s True Devotion to Mary, this phrase signifies our desire to give ourselves entirely to Jesus Christ through Mary.  It also expresses our effort to give our all to every young person we encounter. Through the teams’ example of joy and service, the youth see that these men and women are on fire with the Catholic Faith and long for the same thing in their lives.

Our Method

Totus Tuus calls upon college students and seminarians from across the United States to carry this mission to every young person they encounter.  These young men and women are hired for their energy, enthusiasm, love of the Faith, commitment to spiritual growth, ability to work with a team and a desire to work with youth.

Parish missionaries are grouped into teams of four, each consisting of two men and two women, and are invited to a different parish every week for six weeks, where they conduct a week-long “parish mission,” teaching and inspiring the parish’s first through twelfth grade youth. 

FIVE MARKS OF TOTUS TUUS

1

Catechesis
A comprehensive proclamation of the Gospel and Catholic Church teachings

2

Eucharistic Devotion
A central focus on Jesus Christ in the Blessed Sacrament

3

Marian Devotion
A desire to inspire all to take Mary as their model and pray the rosary

4

Vocational Discernment
Encouraging youth to discern their vocation through the pursuit of holiness and conversion

5

Christian Witness
To provide an experience of joyful Christian living from a team of missionaries