Where have all the young ones gone?

[mellanella]

GEN-X RISING: Decline in young leadership threatens Methodism's futureI wonder if the decline in young people being interested in the pastorate in the UMC is because we've done a rather lousy job as a denomination in terms of supporting our youth and young adults. Many congregations don't affirm the leadership skills of the youth in their

Comments

[jnerd]

I'm not even sure that it's a lack of youth programs. My hometown church had a pretty good (if moderately unstable) youth group, and I was sufficiently encouraged in leadership activities that I was the secretary of the Conference Board on Youth Ministries my senior year of high school. But then I went off to college, and there was nothing. Well, that's not quite true: there were on-campus services (in the Roman Catholic tradition) and a poorly organized student-run bible study, but that was pretty much it for Christian programs. From my sophomore year on, I went to an off-campus church with my friends, but we just went for the one service each week--there weren't any activities geared toward young adults.

At my current church, I've finally found a young adult group that's moderately organized and worth the time out of my busy schedule to join each week, but it's still nothing that asks much more than attendence and discussion each Sunday morning. The truth is, playing a role in the church requires commitment, and that sort of commitment simply isn't encouraged. When I went on my mission trip, I was the youngest in the group...by 8 years. If it's not a question of time availability, it's a question of being able to pay. Few young people can manage to navigate that particular Scylla and Charybdis, and not only does the church not help much, but it doesn't even really ask folks to try. Any involvement I might ever manage to have is going to come from internal drive.

Still, I'm not entirely sure I see a need to panic in these numbers. It's possible (if not entirely plausible) that the people today who would become church leaders are simply distracted by other things and will become clergy in the future. What happens to all of those seminary graduates in the long-term? Sure, a lot refrain from becoming elders when they graduate, but does that mean they never will? And even if they don't ever get ordained, does it follow that they're not ministering? Could all of these students of faith simply be following a different model of a calling than is currently recognized?

The church needs to adjust somehow, but I'm not sure the right adjustment is as obvious as it might seem.

[the_methotaku]

While the situation is still bad it's getting better, and the UMC really does want more first career pastors. The new edition of The Christian as Minister has a new chapter about the challenges faced by people heading to seminary right after college.

In Texas, Wesley Foundations ar being revitalized. In Ohio, OSU has three campus ministries run out of local churches. One is Reconcileing, one conservative and revivalistic, and one is a contemporary church with a Korean heritige.

All the UMCs in my town have young adult Sunday School classes, and in my church the Young Adults have formed a vital part of our youth mission trips for several years; we do the heavy, dangerous jobs the high-school kids can't handle.

Student Forum is bigger and bolder every year!

There is hope!

[mellanella]

Student Forum is bigger and bolder every year!

What is the Student Forum? I've heard of it a bit, but don't know much about it at all.

[mellanella]

I'm not even sure that it's a lack of youth programs.

I don't think youth programs are the problem: their presence or absence. The problem as I see it rests in the support and value of youth as present leaders of the church.

And even if they don't ever get ordained, does it follow that they're not ministering?

I have no doubt that young graduated seminarians are still in ministry, even if they aren't ordained, and that's great. But at the same time, I think there's a huge need for young people to be parish ministers. And I think the low young clergy numbers is a reflection of the larger state of affairs dealing with youth (which we do pretty OK at, at least in terms of numbers) and young adults (which we barely do at all).