In which our regular
writers toss around subjects a little more volatile than usual.
Immanuel Can: The Young People’s group in my local church seems defunct. It wasn’t lack of
leadership — they had a stellar, unselfish, thoughtful leader, who had had
great success in the past, most recently with a large and active cohort that
had just moved on to college / university / career plans. But when
the older class graduated, nobody came in to fill the ranks. It seems that the
new generation of early-teens were involved with other things: sports,
computers, other programs. Not only that, when asked, their parents seemed to see
no particular reason their kids ought to be meeting with other Christian kids
for spiritual or social activities. This is the first time I’ve ever seen a
generation of parents that isn’t totally convinced that getting their kids
involved with other Christian young people is very important to their
development.
So that’s new.
Waving Goodbye to YP
I wonder, Tom, are the days of Young People’s programs past?
Is anything lost there if it is? Were they the right idea in the first place? What
would you say to a group of elders that was realizing that a church without a
young people’s program was becoming a reality? Does the church owe us to have
some specialized program for teens? And if it does, do parents have any
obligation to use it? There are lots of good questions we could ask about that.
Tom: Well, that’s definitely a fair bit to chew on. Let’s begin at the beginning. “Are the days
of YP programs past?” I think they might well be. Gen-Z has been taught to
value (i) entertainment, (ii) their own preferences and opinions, and
(iii) the virtual world over and above the real world, and that includes
many kids from Christian families. There are exceptions, where parents were
diligent about policing internet use, but the vast majority of kids that age would
rather be playing Counter-Strike online than studying the Bible in some dingy
basement. I don’t like that thought, as I have been heavily involved
with teens in times past, but it may be the sad reality. Your local church is
far from alone.
I guess we also may need to distinguish “kids from Christian
families” from “Christian kids”. There are occasions on which they pass for the
same thing, but time often shows they are not.
IC: Oh, quite so. In the Young People’s groups of my youth, there were three types of
participants: (a) Christian kids, (b) kids from Christian homes, but
whose tastes and loyalties turned out to be questionable, and (c) kids
from non-Christian homes, some of whom were Christians and some not. The blend
was always a challenge for any youth leader. In one case I’m thinking of, the
genuinely Christian kids were the moral and social leaders, with great effects
for all. In another, the (rather jaded and indifferent) kids from Christian
homes were dominant, and the results were a disaster for pretty much everyone.
Dealing with young people is always a risk in that respect. The group dynamics
have to be carefully watched, on the one hand, but on the other, too much
“being watched” and not enough liberty to practice (even sometimes by trial and
error) suffocates the kids.
Feed My Lambs
But is it important work? Do we need to be doing it?
Tom: Sure,
absolutely. I don’t know the basis of the claim, but I’ve heard it argued all
the Lord’s disciples were fairly young men, some probably in their teens. And
even if they were not, adult believers always have an obligation to make sure
both our own children and younger professing Christians in the churches are
properly discipled rather than left to rot on the vine. “Feed
my lambs,” the Lord said to Peter. If we don’t do that, we may as well say
goodbye to the version of the church we embrace. Christ’s work will go on
elsewhere, of course — the “gates
of hell” and so on — but we will not be a meaningful part of it, and
our efforts in our own day will have been substantially frittered away. And the
worst thing about that is that it’s our own generation who are doing the active
frittering.
IC: The generation previous to
the present parents supported YP work, for the most part. It’s this new generation,
the one that has early-teen kids now, that sees no particular point. As for
their children, I don’t blame them one bit for absorbing their parents’
indifference.
But let’s suppose (without reason to suppose, of course) that the parents of this
generation do whatever things previous generations of parents have done (or not
done) at home, and that many still expect church attendance from their children
on Sunday. What would be the harm if the Young People’s program in
particular were gone? I mean, it’s one thing to see we need to teach
our children; it’s another to say they need to hang out with each other on
Friday or Saturday night at the church, and do their own group Bible study and
social activities … or is it?
Tom: Well, I think you’re being a
mite generous in assuming this generation of parents is doing the things our
parents did with us: daily Bible reading and so on. I think that’s highly
unlikely. If they are, well, good. But it’s hard to see how a child could enjoy
the things of Christ in his or her home while growing up, then come to their
teen years and suddenly and completely lose interest. Sure, it could happen
here and there; there are always outliers. But not across the board, which is
what we’re seeing today.
Pairing Up
Let’s be frank: Young People’s groups are about Christian kids pairing up with
members of the opposite sex, or at least trying to. So when you tell me nobody
in that early teen age range is interested in getting together to study the
Bible with kids of the same age from their local church, what you are telling
me is that: (a) the teens in your church hate studying the Bible so much
they will even give up opportunities to chase members of the opposite sex in
order to avoid being subjected to it, (b) the teens in your church are
uniquely uninterested in members of the opposite sex, or (c) the teens in
your church have some secular outlet for their interest in the opposite sex,
which means they do not make it any special priority to partner up with fellow
Christians.
Maybe there are other possibilities, but none of them sound good to me.
IC: Right. That’s my worry. I worry that the parents have not made spiritual growth to maturity a
priority for their children, and that the children are now not seeing the point
of pursuing it. Moreover, having not seen what a vigorous spiritual life
actually looks like, they are not convinced it is at all important to find a
spiritually motivated partner. After all, when you’re not planning on going
anywhere yourself, it doesn’t matter who you team up with, right?
But perhaps this is too much to deduce from the death of YP
programs.
The Value of Teen Bible Studies
What I would question is your description of the value of
Bible study activities in the program. I think they are valuable, because
they are often the first opportunity a young person takes to learn things
without his or her parents watching; and that’s a step in maturity and
initiative. Maybe the initial motive involves only the social possibilities;
but the end result can be much more than that, I would say. I have
seen that.
Tom: Oh no, I’m not at all disparaging the value of Bible study activities. I’m just being
realistic about teen motivations in attending Bible studies. They are not
usually hormone-free. One may attend a Bible study in hope of pairing up and
not have it happen, but incidentally learn all kinds of things about the Bible
that serve you well in later life. That is a fine outcome. But I find it
weird when young teens have no interest at all in meeting other young teens who
have something in common. That seems odd ... unprecedented even.
IC: Well, the assumption has to be that young people have not lost all interest in the opposite sex. However,
secular studies have shown that young people today are opting for less
conventional social relationships. For example, dating and socializing in
person are down, and things like pornography and sexting are up. That’s a product
of the video age, which is radically changing the social dynamics of teens. For
example, this article is really something every
parent should know about. And is that what’s happening here? Or is it that
these young people are still opting for embodied sexuality, but not with
Christians? Or are they behaving like their secular counterparts, and going
online? This is something that really needs to be investigated — by every
parent.
Exploring Alternatives?
Tom: That’s a horrifying thought, but it’s not, to the best of my knowledge, what 12- and 13-year-olds from
Christian households are up to en masse. There are probably exceptions, and it’s worth looking into, but without
evidence, I wouldn’t assume that’s what’s going on across the board. If
you tell me it’s common practice in the mid- to later-teens, I’d believe it,
but there’s a hormonal component to sexual interest that is only just kicking
in at 12 or 13. In my experience, it takes a little time to develop the social
skills to get up to speed in that department.
All the same, if you can demonstrate that’s where our 12- and 13-year-olds from
Christian households are at today, then it will not surprise anyone if studying
the Bible is of minimal interest to them.
IC: The problem with large-scale studies like that is that they can only tell you what the average teen
is up to; not what your teen is up to. That’s why the investigation is
necessary — to find out if what you’re dealing with is that, or something else.
One thing for sure: there has to be an explanation why what was considered
essential for Christians in their early teens a few years ago is not being
considered as even an interesting option now. Something has changed. The
yearning to find a partner is not insignificant in that stage of development. If
YP’s is not serving that function anymore, then why not is a very
important question. It’s also the stage at which spiritual independence needs
to be cultivated; and if that’s not being sought anymore, we surely need to
know why.
Tom: Oh, I completely agree. Something is really wrong here. I just can’t decide quite what it is.
Something Rotten in Denmark
You asked what one might say to a group of elders that was
just coming to the realization that a church without a young people’s program
was their new reality. And then you suggested at one point that we have to
consider the possibility that the spiritual needs met by young people’s groups
in previous generations are now being met in other ways. I realize that
you’re trying to cover all the bases here, and trying to be fair, but I’m going
to call foul on that. It just ain’t so. There is nothing spiritual about
teens staying home and playing videogames, or getting involved in secular
sports leagues to the exclusion of fellowship with other Christian teens at a
critical juncture in their spiritual lives. There is nothing spiritual about
so-called Christian parents who think those priorities are just fine.
I think I would say this to the concerned elders:
something is really rotten in Denmark. How did we get here? Is the problem
primarily in the previous generation? I think it might well be.
IC: Well, yeah … I was giving them credit for still doing spiritual activities, if indeed they do. And
you’re right to think I was just giving them the benefit of the doubt, and
don’t think they’re actually doing much of anything, really. But I was not
thereby suggesting that spiritual needs could actually be met by things like
video games. Those aren’t needs, and they aren’t spiritual.
I was trying to ask something like “Well, if parents do have family devotions,
and teach their kids to study at home, and send them to Christian camp in the
summer, and still have them in Sunday School or at least in the main meeting on
Sunday, then what’s the harm in letting YP’s go? It’s only one of many
strategies they could be using.” So I mean that the spiritual needs were
still being met by spiritual means, but just not through a youth program.
The 2020 Christian Family
But probably that’s too much benefit of the doubt even to give. I just see it
as a possible elder’s response to the claim, “Your loss of YP’s signals
something bad.”
Tom: Fair enough. I hope elders
would be more astute, but let’s deal with all the possibilities. I do not
believe for a second that the majority of the Christian parents of today’s
teens are still doing family devotions or even working too hard at encouraging
their children to study the Bible on their own. Maybe they are sending them to
Christian camps, but even then, camp is usually only one week of 52.
I do believe those parents are sending kids to Sunday School, though I doubt they have too much idea what is
taught there and whether it is doing any real good.
So, yes, I’m blaming my own generation and the one right after it for the state of
our youth. I think we are the villains here. And I don’t think
there’s much of an argument to be made in our defense.
IC: Okay. Well, I haven’t got any data on what the average Christian parent is doing with their
child’s spiritual nurturing, so I can’t say anything about that for sure.
What we do know from sound sociological studies is that many nominally
Christian teens have a very weak, immature and incorrect understanding of their
faith … for whatever reason. On average, they’re apparently becoming
what’s called “morally-therapeutic Deists” rather than real Christians. That
is, they believe there’s a God who exists, and that thinking there is one is
“good for you” morally, but that he’s not really involved in actual life. So
some parts of the message are definitely not reaching them.
The Church’s Role
Tom: Okay. Let’s go back to your next question: “Does the church owe us to have some specialized
program for teens?” My answer would be no. Why would it? That said, those who
have responsibility in the churches certainly owe today’s teens some serious
concern about how they turn out. That might mean creating a standard youth
program, or it might mean initiating something else entirely.
IC: Tom, do you think we also made a big mistake some time ago, allowing ourselves to think of
church programs as a sort of replacement for the teaching of a Christian home?
And maybe, just maybe, we’re now seeing that programs aren’t enough. Maybe our
teens are telling us that, even before we realize it, by voting with their
feet. Is that possible?
Tom: It’s not only possible, I believe it’s inevitable. When you remove serious commitment
to teaching Christian truth from the home, you can hardly expect the church to
offer a viable substitute.
IC: But it seemed
to for a time. That is, though it was never enough, there were parents even in
our generation who were relying heavily on that program to cover all bases for
their children. Our generation did have some knowledge of the Bible, and we
were experienced in “doing church stuff”: but we had inherited a lot of it on
the backs of our parents’ real effort, and took it for granted. We didn’t
invest the time to pass any of it along, or very little of it, anyway. And now,
I think we’re down to the children of our children, who are so far from
first-hand spiritual engagement that they’re really asking what was the point
of it all in the first place. And we are not ready for them with the answer.
A Fair Description
Or is that not quite the right description of the situation?
Tom: No, I think that’s fair. As to your last question, “Do parents have any obligation to use
the programs their churches put in place?” I think I might say this:
First, when we are talking about 12- and 13-year old kids, whether children
attend any church program is very much up to their parents. Mine stopped making
me go to anything I didn’t want to attend at age 16, and I think
that’s a reasonable compromise. But in most cases a twelve-year-old doesn’t
know what’s good for him and shouldn’t be the last word on those decisions.
Someone with the ability to see beyond the immediate desires of the child has
to evaluate the worth of these programs. So the looming obsolescence of youth
programs is definitely a parental issue, not just a problem with kids and their
preferences.
Secondly, to the extent that a church’s elders are
attempting to offer some sort of solution to their children’s spiritual needs,
then it is incumbent on parents to do one of two things: either support
your elders and back their play by promoting the initiatives they have in
place, or else offer your elders a viable alternative to traditional youth
groups, assuming you deem them inadequate for your kids’ needs.
If parents can’t be bothered to even do that bare minimum
for their own children, I have great difficulty blaming “the church” for
the current situation.
A good discussion, and it covered the questions that need to be asked. I think you're both right, that this has been a multi-generational fade-away from faith development as a core aspect of family life. I see this sort of pattern in families in my line of work. If mom and dad didn't do something or didn't know how to do something then they were unable to teach it to their children. Then, those children become moms and dads who have the same deficits and therefore cannot pass along what they don't know to their children.
ReplyDeleteThis is also where the church could come in. Of course parents have deficits; none of us knows everything. So if people from outside a family give input into a family then that family stands a chance of importing new skills that would otherwise be absent. This is part of my work as a therapist--figuring out what someone doesn't know and then teaching it to them so they know it firsthand in their own life.
Sadly, I don't see in my church how the people with spiritual understanding and skill have a way to transfer those skills into the lives of others. There's no real venue for this to take place or with regularity. This process requires the rabbi-disciple kind of relationship where the ‘rabbi’ has a very intentional, frequent and long-term input into a younger person's life. It also requires the ‘disciple’ to want this in his/her own life. When church only has a Sunday morning program it lacks person-to-person interaction in any meaningful depth. At my church, we have Bible studies and groups but they use videos or workbooks to 'teach,' so again there is no meaningful person-to-person interaction. Nobody is building up an ability to teach better and nobody is learning from the example and relationship with real-life teachers. Pressing ‘play’ is not a teaching skill.
What comes to my mind as I think about this is how Jesus could teach a large crowd and then turn and disciple his disciples. There are moments recorded in the Gospels where Jesus teaches the crowd in a lecture style, but then afterwards his disciples ask him to explain what on earth he meant. It shows that lectures can get content out to a large number of people, but lecturers are kidding themselves about the long-term effectiveness of that kind of teaching method for a typical crowd. There has to be that one-on-one conversation afterward to get the content to stick and to help make it applicable in an individual listener's life. I see this in the therapy work I do. People can grasp a concept readily and many arrive already knowing the concept already. It's that process of integrating the concept into his/her own everyday life that is the difficulty. It's repetitive and requires lots of trial and error. It can take many tries to find just the right angle of connection for it to click for someone. Really, it involves the individual’s real self to be present because his/her real self can work with concepts and integrate them into real life. Otherwise people are stuck doing / copying / mimicking things, but they don't actually own that is it them, themself actually owning it in their own self.
Absolutely agreed about the limited value of lecturing a crowd. Thanks for the comments, B. Every once in a while the Lord stirs up someone's heart to do things differently. I believe we are living in a time where that is very much needed. Lots to pray about.
Delete