A BRAVE way to kick off some new Young Adult ministry!

Well, you'll never guess who turned up to our brand new Young Adult Retreat at Coolum on the weekend.

The Holy Spirit.

Some quick background: the Emmaus ministry has been giving youth (and more recently, young adults in particular) around Southern Qld a structured way to come together, learn more about faith and vocation, and have lots of fellowship and fun.  Not long after the last Emmaus weekend in March 2014, the organising committee came to a mutual realisation that they had largely aged out of the appropriate demographic, and it was time to revisit and, if necessary, reshape a format for achieving our larger aims for young adult Anglicans.

This was a sometimes emotional process of managing change, which took a lot of time and care. As a result, we found ourselves making a decision to go ahead with a new weekend retreat format only a few weeks out from the campsite booking we had made twelve months earlier.  Should we postpone or just push on with it and see what happened?

We pushed on.  Over the course of just a few weeks, we blitzed social media and parishes with advertising material for the weekend we called BRAVE (see earlier posts below), but many difficulties emerged.  All kinds of people wrote to apologise that they just couldn't make it with such short notice, which was fair enough.  Some registered but then had to pull out for one reason or another.  In the meantime, Lisa Ng and I had to pull together music, IT/AV, a spiritual director, elective topics and leaders, and all the admin around that.

Well, we got there - just. In the end, fourteen young adults aged between 18-25 or thereabouts joined us.  We know for a fact that we have quite a few active people across the Diocese in the 25-35 bracket, and calling on them could have increased our numbers substantially, but we had made a deliberate strategic decision to limit the age-range, so as to really focus on a group of people at a similar life stage.

They were still a diverse group, and not all Anglicans.  What really pleased me was that we had attracted a few people who were completely new to all of our ministries - that's what we want to see! There was also a reasonable gender balance (not always the case) and a fair spread of experiences and backgrounds.

As to the weekend itself, we began on Friday night with regos, dinner (meals at Luther Heights were superb throughout), a welcome to country from the Rev Cathy Laufer, an intro from me and GTKY games from Lisa, followed by Evening Prayer led by Jeremy Couch, AYCF minister at St Mark's Buderim, who introduced the theme of vocation (personal and collective) which would be the basis of his input over the course of the retreat.

 Our main musician, Nicholas Ng from Logan parish, was unexpectedly taken ill during the day, so we had to work around that, but the evergreen Tom 'DJ' Davis (now worshipping at the provisional parish of Springfield) had all the answers.

This first night almost immediately calmed a lot of my own anxieties as I realised that everyone seemed to have a positive outlook and we were all keen to make the most of our time together.

Saturday was huge: many of us began with an early morning walk along the beach, or just took in the magnificent views down the coast.  After Morning Prayer, led by Jeremy Couch (Buderim parish) and breakfast, it was time for our first batch of Electives.

Our Elective topics, leaders and times had all been altered over the course of the planning process, but thankfully all was now in readiness. First up was Mr Andrew Butterworth (Buderim) offering a seminar on Financial decision-making which was well-informed and well-attended.  The other elective was a panel on "Why Be Anglican?" led by Rev Cathy (holding a Hooker-style 3-legged stool), Rev. Michael Farragher from St Lucia, and myself.  I think we all enjoyed exploring the strengths and weaknesses of our denomination, and the Rev. Michael has since referred to it as a 'road to Damascus' moment in terms of his understanding of how committed young Anglicans are seeing our Church right now.

Following morning tea, we moved into a time of "Open Space Technology".  Explaining the OST format would take too long here, but essentially it means participants are able to set the agenda in terms of proposing a topic for which they feel passion and responsibility, and convening and recording a discussion on that topic. This format was selected as it seemed likely to appeal to Young Adults, and it certainly seemed to work in practice, with very positive feedback.

After lunch, we had another round of electives, and this time we welcomed David and Zoe Browne to lead a discussion on Relationships which we knew would be popular, and I went to a wonderful session from Scott and Sarah Windred on sharing the Gospel. I found this a really moving experience as stories were shared around the group, and we considered how we had come to be followers of Christ in the first place, and what might be next for us.

After this, we had another round of OST before free time saw some head back to the beach while David Hale and I headed off for a light spot of geocaching.  Following dinner, the Brownes facilitated an awesome night of wacky trivia in table teams, before a late night Evening Prayer and then a much-needed sleep.  I was very taken by Jeremy's introduction to the idea of "collective vocation" today, as well as the individual model, as the sense was growing among the group that there was a camaraderie here that could become the  launching pad for much more.

Sunday morning came with yet more fantastic weather.  As we cleaned out the dorms, it was very hard to believe that we would soon be heading home.  After the morning Office and another beautiful hot breakfast (a special mention here of the venue's Nespresso machine which took a pounding over the course of the weekend!), it was a crunch time for the group, as we introduced some ideas about where Young Adult ministry could go over the next twelve months.  The response was most enthusiastic, and so we are now looking at three connected arms of ministry: an annual retreat (like this one); quarterly diocesan youth services; and monthly gatherings in regional spots for the benefit of young adults wanting a group to which they can belong.  We proposed that the core 'text' for these monthly group catch-ups could be the program known as A Big Year, which we think is very easy to use (especially when downloaded as a phone app).  The founder of the program, Steve Drinkall, had offered to come to Coolum to speak to the group, but we assured him there was no need to travel so far.  He has instead offered to speak at one of our quarterly youth services, which is wonderful.

After a final OST session and lunch, it was time for our Q&A Panel.  The point has been made by the Sticky Faith team among others, that a reason given frequently for young adults departing the Church is that they felt their questions were either ignored, not answered, or that they would get in trouble merely asking them.  Over the course of the weekend, we had gathered anonymous 'questions on notice' from the group which were then put to the panel: the Rev Simon Keith (Noosa), the Rev Jeremy Greaves (Buderim), Imogen Sweeney and Cassie Boltmann.  Some were more controversial than others, but everyone appreciated the panel members' honest and sometimes revealing responses to how they saw a particular issue. An important learning from this was that committed Christians can and do disagree on particular aspects of the faith, and this does not necessarily mean that one is 'wrong' and one is 'right'.  The mutual respect shown by everyone throughout this session was appreciated by all.   

All too soon, it was time for the final Eucharist (presided over by the Rev Cathy Laufer, who preached on the Transfiguration, which I always think is particularly meaningful on "mountain-top" camps like this one), then thank yous and goodbyes.  Huge thanks from me here to all our guests named above, to whom I am most grateful, and especially to Jeremy Couch for stepping in and preparing so many stimulating and challenging talks; Nicholas Ng and our other musicians and singers for sharing your talents so generously and wonderfully; and Camps Coordinator Lisa Ng, who shared every up, down, fear and ultimate joy of what we were able to put together in this BRAVE weekend experience. We simply must thank God for every small mercy shown to us in this project, and for producing a Spirit-filled experience which was so much more than the sum of its parts, and which has enthused and motivated so many of us so strongly.

If you have a comment or question about the Young Adult Retreat this year or next, please contribute below or contact us at info@aycf.org.au!

Telling Youth the Gospel: For our Sake or Theirs?

Very recently, my parish priest, the Rev Dr Cathy Thomson, preached a sermon that really made me sit up and take notice.  Themes: what should our parish be on about? What is the Gospel? How should we present it to young people? What are we trying to achieve through presenting the Gospel to youth?

From time to time, I find myself wondering whether "liberal-catholic" youth ministry is capable of achieving growth in the same way as "evangelical" youth ministry seems to be.  Perhaps this sermon points us towards an answer to that.

I wasn't the only one who found it instructive and thought-provoking; so many of us did, that it was 'published' through the pew bulletin the next week.  And here it is: 

 

Dear Friends,

So many of you have commented on my sermon of last week, and have asked for a note of the five dot points which I suggested "summed up the gospel." Thank you for your feedback.  I have replicated the whole sermon below, and hope that reading it is something you will find helpful.

 

Today I have decided not to preach on the day’s Scriptures, because I would like to pursue one of the issues that came up at last week’s planning day.  It was suggested that if we want to attract young people to our Church, we have a prior responsibility to be clear in our own minds about the positive message that we think we can offer them: one that that they would understand and be attracted by.  I think our challenge is to be clear about what we understand by “the Gospel” before we attempt to offer it to anyone else.  So what do we mean by saying that we have the Gospel or “Good news”? Please take a moment to think about that...

One way to find out what “the Gospel” is is to go onto the internet where we find a whole range of ways of teaching the gospel through Youtube. Last night on YouTube I watched a young American man with long “dreadlocks” who sure enough “rapped” the gospel in four minutes.  Then there was the Pentecostal pastor wearing a tee-shirt with Jesus as the risen and ascended lamb upon the throne of God complete with halo, who provided an animated spoken rendition of the gospel in five minutes.  I have to say I liked their clarity about what they believed;  I liked their conviction and energy.  I didn’t like their particular slant on the gospel which emphasised human sinfulness to an excessive and guilt-inducing extent.  But to be fair, they did also emphasise albeit in a rather unorthodox way the immeasurable grace of God that overcomes the aforesaid all-pervasive sinfulness and guilt.  I decided that although Youtube is a medium very accessible to the young people to whom we wish to communicate the gospel, it is probably not the best starting point for developing our own clear stance about what we believe the Christian gospel to be.  I turned as you might expect to the Scriptures, if not today’s selection.   I discovered that there are exactly one hundred references to the word “Gospel”, otherwise known as the “Good News” in the New Testament.

[Interjection: I laughed during the paragraph above, because I knew exactly which clips the Rev Cathy was describing.]

Leaving out the fact that the four evangelists wrote their “gospels” which are essentially biographies of Jesus, the other ways of speaking about the Gospel are to call it:

·         the gospel (good news) of God,

·         the gospel (good news) of Christ

·         the gospel (good news) of the kingdom

·         the gospel (good news) of salvation. 

Jesus himself spoke of the gospel of the kingdom, by which he meant that his own existence heralded the fulfilment of God’s reign on earth, and that this would bring liberation from the power of sin and death, and that all people could be united with God into eternity. 

The other three: the gospel of God, of Christ or of salvation,  seem to have the same basic content.  Paul sums it up in I Corinthians 15:1-4 where he writes about what the Gospel is:

3For I handed on to you as of first importance what I in turn had received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, ⁴and that he was buried, and that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures.

 I think churches like ours that are of a liberal –catholic persuasion are frightened to own that gospel because we have heard many reductionist versions of it over the years.  Yet surely we can affirm that Christ died for our sins.  We don’t have to say Christ paid the penalty or took the punishment for our sins, because we know that punishment notion of Jesus’ crucifixion says that we have a God who requires punishment (a punitive God).   And that is problematic when we hear this God referred to as in I John where it says that “God is light; in him there is no darkness at all.”  We also don’t have to say that we are saved by the (precious) blood of the lamb, because we don’t necessarily find that bloody sacrificial imagery very helpful.  But we can still say Christ died for our sins.  The rest of the Gospel, according to Paul, namely that Christ was buried and that he was raised on the third day, is something that we affirm weekly when we say the creed aloud.

This leads to some rather uncomfortable questions:

·         The first is: have we fully appropriated the gospel of liberation for ourselves?  Do we live out of the joy and gratitude of knowing that Jesus died to bear away all our sin and suffering, and have we allowed that to transform us into people with God-focussed lives?  I ask this question because if we haven’t done that, we will have nothing to offer to the young people, or anyone, who might come among us.

·         The second question is why do we want to encourage young people?  Is it because we truly want to offer them the liberating power of the gospel which we know and can demonstrate in our own lives, or is it that we are afraid that if we don’t, our church will die?  In other words, do we want to have more young people among us for their sake or for our sake?  Because if it’s the latter, we’re never going to be able to convince them, and quite rightly, that there’s anything worthwhile in it for them.

 
Let me offer a summary of the gospel that is something of an expansion of Paul’s but which contains the same basic elements, and is consistent with the way parishes like ours think theologically:

·         The gospel tells us that God gave creation life, and human beings as part of it;

·         In working out its destiny, the world is sometimes marked with sin and suffering and human beings contribute to that;

·         God sent his Son Jesus to live and work among human beings on this earth, to teach them God’s way of love and to live a life of integrity and courage;

·         Jesus offered himself as bearer of all the sin and suffering of the created world so that these could be done to death on the cross;

·         God raised Jesus up on the third day as the hope of the salvation of all.  This resurrection is the mark of our transformation as well as Christ’s, leading to our having a life full of meaning now, and ultimately, life with God into eternity.

Is this an attractive gospel to us?  Can it be an attractive gospel to the young people?   Well it seems to me that this apparently amorphous generation of “young people” are really not too different from the rest of us.  They live fairly pressured lives through work and study and competing for success in their careers; they often are beleaguered by financial pressures, a big mortgage, they’re concerned about finding a partner, and when they do about when to get married, whether they can afford to have children, and when is the best time to start trying.  And once they have children they struggle to provide for them all the opportunities they need to grow and thrive and make their own contributions to the world of which they are global citizens.  Statistics suggest also that they are a generation more prone to marital failure, homelessness, depression, mental illness and suicide than any before them.

The gospel is a dynamic meeting point for joy and sorrow, sin and righteousness, violence and peace, and it is the overcoming of life’s vagaries and challenges as well as the fulfilment of its promise.  Let us pray God that we as a congregation may have the privilege of sharing this wonderful gospel with all who are drawn to Christ both young and old, and that we may know how to articulate God’s saving power in our lives whenever such a testimony is required of us.  Amen

I am encouraged and quite excited at the very positive response I have had from the parish as we continue to plan our life of ministry and mission into the future.

With my love and with God's blessing,

Rev'd Cathy.

How about that?  What do you think?

In the Media: our "Parenting in the Digital Age" forum at Bribie Island this week

Community forum helps parents figure out 'tween speak'

Caboolture News, 18 July 2013

 

ARE you ready to Instagram a selfie and tag your bestie while having a LOL?

 

Did you catch all that?

 

The world of social media and the buzz words surrounding the phenomenon will be revealed at a community forum at St Peters Anglican Church, Bribie Island on Monday from 9.30am until noon.

 

The annual forum, hosted conjointly with the Mother's Union, has turned the topic this year to tween culture.

 

The sometimes awkward and unknown territory of children who are not quite teenagers and not quite young children is often ignored.

 

Ministry for the Anglican Church youth, children's and families director Jonathan Kemp hopes to arm parents and grandparents with tools to communicating and understanding their tweens for the betterment of the family.

 

Mr Kemp said the forum should show parents how to maintain relationships in a technology-driven world when a pre-teen has their head bowed in their iPad or mobile phone.

 

"There is a real sense that a lot of parents are unsure about this area of tweens so we will look at how technology shapes us and reflects an identity for young people and how families need to set boundaries in terms of how young people and parents are using technology and how often," Mr Kemp said.

 

"Every family needs to find that balance.

 

"We hope to help parents adopt a common sense approach to technology, because while it is something that is inescapable, it is something parents needs to handle in an intentional way."

 

Mr Kemp will also provide parents with a translation guide to tween speak.

 

Smart phone applications such as Snapchat, Instagram and Facebook will be explored.

 

"I hope parents come away with a sense of responsibility but with far less fear they may have come with of the world of technology," Mr Kemp said.

 

The seminar is free, register your interest to help with catering purposes, phone the church on 3408 3191.

Dear Jonathan: Social Action as a Youth Group

Even better than a Dear John letter is a Dear Jon/Jonathan letter, and I was asked recently for some ideas on getting a youth group involved in social action projects, perhaps starting with a simulation game.  Here's how I replied:

Simulation games are almost always good. You probably know that Stephen Hooper specialises in these things? He ran a big one on the Anglican Schools Students Network conference last year, but it needed more time. Doing a 3-4 hour (or even overnight) epic would be pretty memorable for all involved, I would think.

On my shelf is a book called "Ideas for Social Action" by Tony Campolo.  It's quite old (1983!) but many of the ideas inside are still completely applicable. For example, at St Lucia we use the idea called "Supermarket Stakeout" a couple of times a year - you get the group to stand outside a supermarket, and when people approach, you give them a slip of paper asking them to buy an extra item for the Inala pantry. If they bring back an item to you, you give them a thank-you card with your church details inside etc. (You've got permission from the supermarket manager, and of course you don't hassle the customers - not everyone will have the money or desire to buy something extra. But it's an exercise where everyone wins. The book has lots of other ideas too.

 

The Roscoe Library has several books on teens and/or parishes and social action - free to borrow, as you know.

 

I'd maybe start by asking the group (or a few of them) to name a cause they'd like to raise funds for. Then just try doing something straightforward to get them into the hang of it e.g. a carwash (if it's warm enough).  If you want to get some attention, you could have a continuous reading relay of the Bible all the way through. Reading aloud at a normal speed normally takes from Friday night to Sunday morning, just in time for church. Would people in the congregation sponsor the group to do that, so the money then goes to your cause?

 

If your group is interested in the asylum seeker debate, they could contact Anglicare SQ about the BRASS program (see attachment). Could be controversial!

 

My old youth group once doorknocked virtually our whole suburb for Freedom From Hunger: we raised over $1000 in a day (this was a long time ago) and got a framed certificate from FFH for being the biggest fundraising group in Brisbane. So if there's a doorknock coming up soon, you could do that, though many schools seem to do it too.

 

When I speak to parishes and groups on this kind of topic, often I mention the following (taken from a PPT slide):

 

What makes service projects empowering for children and youth?

 

Do the actual work and don't just observe.

 

Work with accepting adults who don't criticize their efforts.

 

Have important responsibilities.

 

Have a sense that they can make a contribution.

 

Have the freedom to explore their own interests and develop their own ideas.

Have opportunities to reflect upon the meaning of the activities.

So my point here is that even if the project isn't itself headline-grabbing (e.g. a world record attempt), if it fulfils most or all of these criteria, it will have served a very useful purpose and will probably also motivate the group to fire up for its next project.

There is a little group of us meeting up in the next fortnight to discuss how youth / Anglicare / ABM may be able to work better together. If something good eventuates out of that, I'll let you know.  I suspect it will become a topic at the next Bring It! meeting in late August!

Don't hesitate to get back in touch as often as necessary, and feel free to forward this on to others.  Thanks for the fantastic work you're doing - and this is just the beginning!

Peace in Christ,

Jonathan Kemp

Big Weekend Part II

On Saturday afternoon, I went to the Darnell Room within the St John's Cathedral complex to attend the GFS Annual General Meeting.

If you haven't heard of GFS before now, I'd recommend taking a minute to research who they are and what they do. GFS is an organisation with a very long history of excellent children's ministry. Their most obvious presence in recent times has been in the form of kids' clubs under the banner of KidsPlus+, and there are several KidsPlus+ groups alive and well within the Anglican Diocese of Brisbane, including those at Kenmore, Bundaberg and Logan.

They have also become increasingly well-known recently for their extremely generous provision of financial grants to parishes carrying out youth or children's ministry of virtually any kind (not just KidsPlus+ groups). I was happy to attend the AGM to pass on my thanks personally to GFS for their amazing support of so many YCF ministries. Their grants have lifted the spirits of many of us working in the field!

Claye, Lesley B, Aaron.

A huge and unexpected bonus from being at the AGM was hearing from Bronwen Healy, the founder of the Hope Foundation, a Christian charity with an audacious and astounding mission. Bronwen spoke to acknowledge the support of GFS for her Foundation and to explain some of the ongoing challenges she is facing.


Lesley B giving Bronwen a cheque...with feeling!

I hear Bronwen's testimony is pretty powerful, and I can believe it based on her few words here. Wow.

Another great moment was hearing from two Formation students (i.e. "student priests" if you like), Claye and Aaron, who are the beneficiaries of more grants from GFS to assist them in their studies.  Thanks GFS and well done, guys!

And even then, the weekend wasn't over!  On Sunday night, I joined the teens and young adults of Kenmore parish with their great clergy the Rev. Bev Bell and the Rev. Vince Conway for their regular U-Nite service. Always great music and input: the next meeting will be a Bible Study on 14 April and the next U-Nite service will be Sunday 28 April: a sausage sizzle at 5pm followed by the service at 6.  You would be most welcome to come along from wherever you are!



Eggs before Easter, GFS AGM and other good times.

Relay with gloves, glasses...and eggs.

One of the best parts of my job is travelling around to different parishes and seeing young people meeting together in a safe, secure place where they can have fun and learn more about Jesus and the Christian journey without worrying about what's happening elsewhere for a while.

Last Friday, I made it down to Logan Anglican parish (St Mark's, Daisy Hill) to join the Youth@APOL  (Anglican Parish of Logan) for their Term 1 break-up.  What a great group!  About 17 teens turned up, alongside their four wonderful leaders, Lisa, Frances, Tom and Howard. The group is clearly a diverse bunch but the children of Africans, South Sea Islanders and Australians competed in mixed teams in a fantastic spirit of fellowship.



Some incredible skills here in egg-swiping!

I admit I was a little worried when Lisa pulled out a big basket of coloured eggs and started handing them out, but after I gave my blue one a bit of a shake, I was fairly reassured I was dealing with the hard-boiled kind... which is SLIGHTLY less concerning at the start of a Youth night, but I knew we weren't out of the woods just yet.  I've seen some very disturbing messy games nights in my time, and eggs were often a big part of them.

90 minutes later, we had done almost everything it was possible to do with the eggs: hunt for them, run around with them on spoons, roll them, grab them, drop them, unpeel them... I don't think I saw anyone actually eat one, but it could have happened when I wasn't looking.

The Blue team won tonight's Egg-olympics, but not without a big struggle.  The Easter egg hunt inside the Church and Hall was also very competitive, though pleasingly no chocolate appeared to be consumed before the end of the night when it became open slather.

It was great to catch up with Fr Geoff, and also with Jeremiah, the leader of the African migrant community within the parish.

The Group Deal

As we shared a lavish supper towards the end of the evening, I was quite taken by the group's Mission Statement on the wall.  Does your group have a Mission Statement like this one?

Mission Statement

I was also delighted to see a 'social contract' or as it's sometimes known, a 'group deal' statement where the group members and leaders decide by consensus what kind of behaviour will be considered OK and what kinds will be not OK when the group is in session.  It's very important that the group deal is abided by and referred to frequently as the year rolls along.

Great to meet you, Youth@APOL, and I look forward to seeing more of you this year!  Youth@APOl is open to all highschoolers and meets at St Mark's Daisy Hill from 7 to 9 every Friday night during term time. Contact the Parish office vis the link above for more info.