And Then There Were None

Last time, we discussed the rising trend of young people not identifying with any faith. Here, I'm going to propose a few ways to fix that. (For the old post, click here)

          I think the best way would be to begin to take these questions seriously. If a young person comes asking a serious question with a complicated answer, don’t sugarcoat it. They are honest questions in need of an honest answer. A much more important, and probably more successful, way of keeping them Catholic, though, is to treat them as adults.

Why are young people so serious about sports or school? In athletic circumstances, high school students are treated as adults. They are forced to commit to commit to practices and games, and at the beginning of the season, the coach makes it clear that the athletes will be treated as adults. They will get the privileges, but will also have the same expectations. In school, the students, especially seniors, are treated as though they are ready, and in fact about to, go out into the real world and begin their lives. They are made to believe that they need to learn how to act around adults and how to get their act together. They are told that this is what the world will be like and people will expect so much of them. The answers they gave in middle school are no longer good enough. Proof is demanded of everything they claim. Simply saying “my dad told me” or “the teacher said so” doesn’t work on tests anymore. The world is throwing stress at them, demanding that they handle it like grown adults. School administrators tell them they are expected to act like adults. Teachers talk to the students as adults. Parents give their children more and more freedom and at the same time demand more and more responsibility. Students are getting jobs where employers are demanding them to act as professionals. In each area of their lives, young people are having more and more demanded of them, and at the same time, they are being treated more and more as adults.

In the spirit of trying to reach young people, many parishes across the country have tried to reach young people in a different manner, though. Youth ministry programs have opened up to try to reach these people. In parishes where these programs don’t exist, they

An example of a gimmick right here.

are pushed as being the best possible way to reach them. In theory, these would work. Unfortunately, the methods of dealing with the youth are often different than the methods of the more prevalent influences in their lives. Often, in the youth ministry programs, the young people are treated as being still children. The people will show up to one or two of the meetings, then when they realize that this is being directed towards middle school-age students.  The youth ministers use little gimmicks that they were taught in their workshops on how to work with children.

As a young person, I’ve been on a number of retreats, and none of them have been the same, but I can say that the ones that are the most disappointing are the ones that are put on by my Catholic high school. Each retreat uses a different gimmick to try to get the kids to connect with Christ. After the retreat, the campus ministry team meets with the youth who helped lead the retreat. Each time, the questions are the same. “What went well? What should we change? Is there anything we should add?” I’d suggest getting rid of the gimmicks. Let the young people encounter the fullness of the Church. Will they understand it? Certainly not the first time. But the awe-inspiring wisdom and sheer immensity of the Church will keep them coming back until they do.