Meet Samantha Ayers, our Coordinator of Young Adult Ministry!
Samantha hails from the Piney Woods region of east Texas (Tyler to be exact) where she grew up with an older brother. Both parents were athletes and her Dad was career Air Force. Her Mom was a Director of Parks & Recreation for over 40 years in Abilene, Louisiana, and Tyler.
She was raised Catholic but did not embrace the faith with vigor until her sophomore year at UT Tyler when young missionaries from the FOCUS organization invited her to join their Bible study and small group discussions.
After college, she began her full-time career as a campus missionary for 5 years with FOCUS. She spent 2 years at the University of Colorado at Boulder and then 3 years at Texas A&M – Kingsville. After 5 years she was a missionary team leader she elected to leave FOCUS and “get a normal job”. She became the manager of a Scooter’s coffee shop in Lewisville and initially enjoyed the change of scenery. Then one day two of her friends sent her the same text message regarding the availability of the youth ministry position at Prince of Peace, neither knowing that the other was doing the same thing. Samantha “got the message”, applied for the position, was selected, and joined us last spring.
One of her greatest desires for young adults at POP is that they experience deep down the love and mercy of Jesus Christ. To that end she vigorously promotes the inclusion of the Chaplet of Divine Mercy with the rosary, frequent Confession, and being merciful themselves to all in their spheres of influence.
Her main hobby is enjoying music. Her vocation is songwriting and she just recently began taking keyboard lessons. She has one song on Spotify (“Not Alone” using her middle name Corine) that she quickly dashed off when she learned two of her friends were coming over to present her with a Valentine’s gift and she wanted to give them something in return. It has already been listened to over 5000 times!
Article by Monte Hausermann
Photo Credit: Tori Harris Gray