Two fresh faces have joined Sydney Catholic Youth (SCY) within the Sydney Centre for Evangelisation: Rachael Johnson and Koe Evangelista. Their gifts, stories and zeal bring an exciting new chapter to the faith in Sydney.
They come from different parts of the archdiocese and have different talents and personalities, but they share one conviction: their gifts aren’t for themselves but for the church’s mission to young people.
Koe grew up in western Sydney, where faith, Filipino family culture and parish life were woven together from childhood. His parents led music at Mass, his mother sang and his father played guitar, and he soon picked up both gifts.
Music was his first encounter with SCY. “What began as weekend youth group involvement grew into years of serving at events, liturgies and gatherings across the archdiocese,” he says.
Koe has played at national youth events and accompanied pilgrims to World Youth Day, often with little more than his guitar.
Young Catholics may have seen him perform at last year’s Purpose Conference. For him, the best use of his gift is “when worship creates an atmosphere where young people can encounter God together.”
Now SCY’s youth officer for the western region, he wants to keep building that sense of joyful community. “One of my dreams is a regional gathering called ‘West Fest’—a day for youth ministries across Western Sydney to come together for formation, fellowship and food,” he reflects.
He names his strengths as “relationship, joy, and the ability to find and empower others with complementary gifts,” especially clergy, lay leaders and local theologians who can offer rich formation.
He hopes young Catholics who feel alone or on the margins will find a vibrant, welcoming community and hear church teaching as an expression of God’s love, not just distant rules.
Looking back to when he joined a parish youth group in 2016, he believes his younger self would be “really happy and really inspired by where God has led me, through growth, mistakes and grace into this role today.”
Rachael Johnson brings a love of beauty, story and the human heart. A budding actress, writer and singer, she sees the arts as “a touchpoint between heaven and earth, making the invisible visible.”
“I’ve been singing for over 20 years and reached a semi‑professional level—at one point I even considered opera,” she says. “But I realised my deepest joy is singing in church.”
Rachael’s acting fuels her love of storytelling: “There’s something powerful about embodying a story and bringing it to life.” Above all, faith is central to who she is, and she has refocused on singing at Mass and making Christ known through teaching.
Before joining SCY, Rachael taught religion full time. That classroom experience sharpened one of her greatest strengths: listening deeply and then communicating the faith in ways that connect with people’s real lives.
She is passionate about relational evangelisation, helping young people meet Christ not as an abstract idea but as a real friend present in their own story.
Encountering St Thérèse of Lisieux’s Story of a Soul as a teenager moved her from an intellectual faith to a deeply personal one, awakening a longing for friendship with Christ.
“As a youth officer, my primary task is supporting the frontline of youth ministry, parish leaders and volunteers, especially as they reach young people who feel untethered or lost at sea without the anchor of faith,” she says.
“SCY expands that outreach from a lifeline to one person to support for hundreds. I want to help others navigate relationships and re‑tether young people in ways that are godly and genuinely healthy. I’m drawn to personal encounters with God that shape how we live, relate and lead, and I hope my life reflects that, quietly, steadily, with integrity and care.”
Together, Koe and Rachael demonstrate the breadth of gifts within SCY and the Sydney Centre for Evangelisation: music and art, theatre and story, community‑building and deep listening.
Their shared hope is simple: through SCY’s work, young people across Sydney will discover in the Catholic church not only truth, but a home, a community, and the face of Christ.
 team within the Sydney Centre for Evangelisation, Rachael Johnson and Koe Evangelista, young Catholics whose gifts, stories and zeal speak bring an exciting new chapter to the faith in Sydney.){kind=link}