ATLANTA-Confirming in 10th grade is already the practice in some parishes, but will shift the approach for other parishes. Father James Caffery, MS, pastor of St. Thomas the Apostle Church, Smyrna, and priest vicar for that region, said the parish has confirmed teens in the spring of 10th grade for the past seven years. "I think it is a natural," he said. "We have something for them all through high school." In the ninth grade, St. Thomas the Apostle teens are invited to join Life Teen, which includes a 5 p.m. Sunday Mass, Life Nights, speakers and retreats. "Preparation for confirmation is also an introduction into Life Teen. It is voluntary," Father Caffery said. "Once they're confirmed, they've had a taste of Life Teen." "They're able to begin to form community during preparation for confirmation and that community continues when confirmation is done," keeping teens coming in 11th and 12th grades to the Life Teen Mass and programs, he said. The pastor and parochial vicars individually interview the confirmation candidates each year about how they plan to live out their Christianity in school and at home. In conducting interviews he finds teens mature and facing many incredibly tough situations. "They are really something," he said. "They kind of find similar people with similar values" in their schools and neighborhood environments. "I don't think I was ever that mature" at their age, the pastor said. While older students will bring more maturity to the process, family support will be needed also, said Marie Trujillo, who directs religious education at St. Thomas More Church, Decatur, and St. Thomas More School. The practice at St. Thomas More has been to confirm in the seventh grade, with a combined class from the parish school and parish school of religion, and the curriculum for the year is essentially devoted to preparing for the sacrament. "I'm hoping very much that it works," Trujillo said of the new 10th grade confirmation norm. "I do think kids are more mature (in 10th grade). As far as owning and being responsible for their faith, it is better." At times, she said, seventh-graders have said- "not in a scared way, in an honest way"- that they weren't ready to receive the sacrament of confirmation. Sometimes they say their family is not practicing their faith and as seventh-graders they couldn't get to church on their own. By 10th grade, they could, she said. On the other hand, she hopes that there won't be a drop-off of youth who move into high school and don't continue with their religious formation. "It is so dependent on families to really affirm and support this," she said. "I want them to come back and receive the sacrament. We are looking for a lot of support from the families on this."