MARBLEHEAD -- Our Lady Star of the Sea Parish recently honored 16 young people who went above and beyond the standard commitment religious education in Christian service at their home parish.

At a family liturgy Mass on June 1, the parish presented the Anna E. Kelly Scholarship-Youth Ministry Award to high school seniors from the parish, who served four years of Christian service there. The students each received a $1,000 scholarship, for a total of $16,000 given to students this year.

Service activities by the students included ministries as lectors, altar servers, religious education teachers' aides, cantors and choir members, service at My Brother's Table -- the largest soup kitchen on the North Shore founded in 1982 -- and the Marblehead Interfaith Food Pantry, as well as other service activities.

With 900 students in parish religious education programs from first-graders through juniors in high school, pastor of the parish Father Michael L. Steele and religious education director Mary J. Pagliarulo praised scholarship winners for the consistent and visible example of their witness to Jesus Christ.

"I am just so pleased that our students are willing to give four years of their high school years to Christian service," Father Steele said.

The Christian service program at the parish gives students a chance to serve the parishes as an extra activity, beyond their religious education.

Father Steele quoted Acts 1:8, where Christ calls his apostles to be his witness.

"This is a ministry that they have adopted throughout the years, to be involved as a person of faith. It is added beyond their classroom time. Everyone does Christian service for confirmation, you know, but this is years of choosing a ministry," he said.

From Marblehead High School, the following students listed with the colleges they plan to attend received the scholarship: Alea Moscone, UMass Amherst; Jon Johnston, Salem State University; Hannah Harper, St. Anselm College; Sydney Cayen, Indiana University; Abigail Bostley, UMass Amherst; Suzanne McCarthy, Villanova University; Caroline Helmes, Tulane University; Graham Jackson, Duke University; Ben Jackson, Northwestern University; Margaret Rockett, Pepperdine University; Mia Sweeney, Elon University.

From St. John's Prep in Danvers, the following students listed with the colleges they plan to attend received the scholarship: Brandon Howell, Champlain College; Will Tentindo, Boston University; Seamus McGorray, Emerson College; Christopher Casey, Jr., Franklin and Marshall; Jack Cushing, Boston College.