following on from my enthusing about mark yaconelli’s article (see a couple of posts below), i thought it would be worth adding a bit more about what he’s been up to for the last eight years…
he pioneered the youth ministry and spirituality project which has experimented in introducing spiritual practices to youth ministers and groups in north america. the results unsurprisingly have been transformative. have a look round their site and in particular the resources/practices page may be useful. this is how they describe it…
The Youth Ministry & Spirituality Project started with a number of questions: How do we keep youth ministers from burning out? How do we move youth discipleship beyond fun & entertainment? How do we keep youth ministry from being isolated from the adult congregation? How do we address the constant anxiety that seems to infect most youth ministries? Can youth programs have spiritual depth? And most importantly, how do we keep the companionship of Jesus at the center of the ministry?
We wish we could tell you that we answered all of these questions. Instead we struggled upon some life-giving possibilities. Here you’ll find all of the principles, practices and processes that we’ve developed in our exploration of youth ministry and Christian spirituality. This is our attempt to articulate a way of ministry that seeks a growing attentiveness and presence to both God and young people.
i hesitate to call any of these things worship tricks as it sounds like it trivialises them but they are practices that have worked down the ages in enabling people to pray, read the bible and encounter god. so i am making this list of practices worship trick 83. but you can’t rush through this stuff – you have to stop, pause, slow down, linger, reflect, not grab it at the last minute off the shelf….
there is a symposium on youth ministry and spirituality in san fransisco in june. i am gutted that this doesn’t co-incide with my visit – it looks great!
in the last iasym journal kenda creasy dean wrote an article of what she saw as the hopeful trends in youth ministry. one of them was this engagement with spiritual practices. it’s like a quiet revolution that is taking place. i’m excited about it. i enjoyed tony jones book soul shaper that introduces some practices to youth ministry. in the uk my wife jen is currently editing a book on contemplative prayer and youth ministry – it’s called tune in chill out. we (proost) are producing a CD Rom to go with it that is shaping up nicely with a mix of music/meditation tracks, flash animations/reflections, video, and written pdf sheets…
and i think this whole area is not really just a youth ministry thing. often what you see as the edge in youth ministry gives you a clue for where the church may be headed when it plays catch up. so this is probably a healthy direction that large portions of the church will be heading down (i realise some have been there for years but you know what i mean)….
amazing link to the ymsp sight with great articles. do you think this sort of youth ministry can be implemented with junior high students? i see this working with high school and college aged kids, but junior high students still seem to fit the mold of those needed to be entertained. what do you think?
i think you’d be better to ask mark yac this question. i’m not sure what ages exactly they have worked with. there’s no doubt that this isn’t the only thing you would do with young people. they need fun, play, nessing around etc… my own experience is that it depends on the kids a bit – we find a lot of younger kids love the labyrinth for example. my own son used the jesus prayer with a cord each night for some time when he was 10 after we had had someone come and introduce it at grace….