Youth minister aims to inspire at wrap-up rally
Randy DonGiovanni, president of RandyDon Ministries, speaks to students and other area residents during a rally Saturday at Washington High School.
A band from Central Assembly of God Church performs during a rally at Washington High School Saturday.
No one would have pegged Eric Miller for shy as the sophomore strutted back and forth in the gymnasium.
But he said that before his best friend challenged him to rap in public three years ago, “I used to be this shy, closed person.”
But that person was unrecognizable when Miller, 17, of Charleroi performed one of his original Christian rap songs at an assembly at Washington High School Saturday evening.
The roughly three-hour event featured Randy DonGiovanni – president of the Byron, Mich.-based nonprofit RandyDon Ministries – who proclaimed an explicitly Christian message that was absent from his remarks when he spoke earlier in the week to students at schools throughout the county.
On Saturday, DonGiovanni mixed references to slang, pop culture and technology with Old and New Testament stories and personal anecdotes during his energetic address to the mostly high school-age audience of about 150.
“Some of you, your fathers hurt you so bad, you’re just like, ‘I hate them.’ Just be careful. I talked about this while I was at your schools. The thing you hate, you will become,” DonGiovanni said, a keyboard giving off pensive chords in the background. “The very thing you love, you will leave. So quit looking at God the Father as your earthly father.”
A group of parents, teachers and other area residents calling themselves “On Point” worked with school district officials to organize the week of school assemblies, during which DonGiovanni spoke to about 3,200 students at 11 area schools.
A 1977 Trinity High School graduate, DonGiovanni focused during the weekday assemblies on bullying, drug addiction and self-mutilation.
“We saw the devastation that the heroin epidemic is having in Washington County, and we wanted to do something about it,” said On Point member Mike Zatta of Washington, who’s known DonGiovanni for years and serves on the board of the RandyDon Ministries.
Zatta said officials in some area school districts already invited DonGiovanni to come back next year.
On Saturday, the youth pastor appealed to those gathered by contrasting what he sees as the shortcomings of secular society with the message of the Gospel.
At one point during his remarks, DonGiovanni held up his smartphone and began speaking to the virtual personal assistant app Siri.
“Hey Siri,” he said. “Would you die for me?”
“I’ve never really thought about it,” a tinny voice said from DonGiovanni’s phone.
“See, I’m trying to make a point here, that we wouldn’t rather trust Siri than we would a God that created us,” DonGiovanni said.
The assembly included music by a band from Central Assembly of God Church in Houston, several numbers by Irwin, Westmoreland County-based Soulsteps Dance Co., prayer and raffle giveaways.
Canon-McMillan High School sophomore Sarah Stanek volunteered at the rally when DonGiovanni appeared Friday. The next day, she came to watch him speak again.
“Our goal is to change Washington County,” said Stanek, a member of Central Assembly of God. “People are hurting.”