Introducing the reimagined WildRoots Summer Worker Program

By Zoe Matties, Manitoba Program Coordinator

Jan 6, 2026

What do you do when faced with the bewildering world we live in? Do you adapt your behaviour and adopt new practices? Do you keep going with business as usual? Or do you cling desperately to the past, a time that may have felt more secure? In times of cultural upheaval, people respond in a variety of ways as they try to cope with or adapt to the changes unfolding around them.

Now, imagine you’re a young person, looking towards the future you have ahead of you, and it all looks so very bleak. You open up your phone only to see story after story proclaiming that the planet is doomed, the job you’re training for will be replaced by AI, and the economy is on the verge of collapse. Maybe you start to wonder: Where is God in all of this? Where is the church? Why bother even caring anymore?

In this kind of media environment, we must be intentional about searching out stories that remind us it’s not too late, that is hope is still possible. (Fix the News is a fantastic resource for this, in case you, too, need some good news!). We are in need of tools, practices, liturgies, and stories that work to form us in a different way than the outrage-and-apathy machine of the social internet.

Theologian Debra Rienstra recommends that in such times of upheaval we would do well to become pilgrims heading towards “refugia”. A refugia is an ecological term describing a little pocket of life safely hidden away from the destruction of an erupting volcano. These pockets allow life to persist and to eventually flourish again after the crisis has passed. To become a people of refugia, requires a journey of sorts into the wilderness where we can confront the difficulty in front of us, but also prepare for the ways in which God is making all things new.

“A refugia faith,” Reinstra writes, “regards our dire conditions honestly but immerses fear and despair in longing for God’s promised new life. That longing gives us the courage to face the difficult preparations necessary for a renewed world, however painful and disorienting they may be.” *

For a number of years, A Rocha in Manitoba has hosted a group of young adults during the summer months for job experiences in environmental education, conservation science, urban agriculture, and communications. Participants take on tasks such as forest and bird monitoring, leading day camps, and growing fresh vegetables. Beyond the hands-on work, we aim to create a refugium of sorts, a community where participants can ask hard questions, learn together, and face the world’s challenges with hope and courage rather than despair.

This year we’re excited to re-introduce WildRoots, a sixteen-week paid paid summer work program designed for young adults. Through hands-on work, learning, mentorship, and community rhythms, participants are invited to incorporate creation care into daily practice. Working as part of a cohort, WildRoots participants support the delivery of A Rocha Manitoba’s programs. In fact, they get to experience all three throughout the summer, giving participants a variety of experiences in different work roles.

Throughout the program participants engage in learning sessions, daily shared practices, mentorship, and two retreats at A Rocha’s Boreal Ecology Centre. Leadership development, ecological knowledge, and spiritual formation are woven together into an experience designed not just to build skills, but to shape people.

In a time when so many young people feel overwhelmed, disconnected, or uncertain about the future, WildRoots offers something countercultural: a place to slow down, pay attention, work with your hands, and rediscover hope rooted in community, faith, and creation.

Of course, we don’t offer a solution to every problem we face. But we do try to embody a small pocket of life where courage can grow, imagination can be renewed, and young leaders can be formed for the long work of caring for creation and one another.

*Refugia Faith: Seeking Hidden Shelters, Ordinary Wonders, and the Healing of the Earth, Debra Rienstra, 2022, p. 31

Featured Photo by Zoe Matties