Networked Culture #3 - (From Thursday Jan 26th)

Let’s pick up where I left off on the previous two networked culture posts.  If you haven’t read them, it’s up to you if you want to scroll down before reading this one…

The session started with one of the attendees asking a question that had been plaguing him since the last session: “How am I supposed to do anything, when I offer meaningful opportunities for youth to participate in their faith development, and to participate in the life of the church, but they don’t even show up?  Heck, we even sat them down and asked them what they wanted to be doing and it didn’t make any difference.”

The response actually dragged us so far off the planned route (but man oh man what a ride!) that I want to make sure to include it in this post:

In the church, we are very skilled at separating responsibility and authority.  We tell people – be they leaders, volunteers, or members – through words or how we live out our community life, that they have the responsibility to do x, y, and z … but they have no authority to change how it’s done.

This becomes the lived reality for teens in the church as well.  When we ask them to tell us what they would like to be doing, they come to the conversation already aware that they have absolutely no authority to actually implement change.  Neither, in many cases, does their youth minister.  For instance, I can't just walk in and say "guess what folks, we're no longer doing Sunday morning youth group.  It will be on Wednesday nights instead.  Sunday will be about worshipping as a community upstairs."  Even though the principles and reasons are sound, the authority still gets filtered through committees, after-meeting conversations in the parking lot, and in some cases even the ever-present church rumour mill.  In the church, you need a permit, and teens are as aware of this as everyone.

In the course of the ensuing discussion, we arrived at the conclusion that we, as the church teach kids basketball skills, and assume that will be enough when we expose them to religion ( I told you … it was a wild ride!)  From here, we jumped into situated learning theory, and landed on legitimate peripheral participation (let it never be said that the church doesn’t know how to appropriate jargon from other disciplines!)  Still, there’s some validity to this, so I’ll break it down.

How do we know that what we invite our youth to participate in is legitimate?  To start with, it’s something the church really does; that is to say, it’s something already in existence in the life of the whole.  Consider “youth Sunday worship” … if youth participation in corporate worship doesn’t happen any other time other than the four times a year earmarked as youth Sundays, then it really isn’t legitimate.  Another example that really resonates with me from my earliest youth Mexico trips is the invitation to paint the fence around the orphanage that has clearly already been painted in the past two months.  The default projects designed to keep youth busy are not legitimate.

Peripheral means that the invitation we are extending is to be involved in something that may or may not be at the very core of the life of the community of the whole, but if it is not at the center, it is still directly connected to that center and in close proximity to it.  Here’s the kicker: the connection/centrality should be blatantly obvious to the youth you’re inviting.  If you have to explain or rationalize the connection, you’re too far outside the boundaries.

Participation means just that – they are participating.  It means they are performing alongside others, never alone.  Running with the primary example thus far, it’s a shift away from youth being downstairs in youth group all but four Sundays of the year (when they come up to lead youth worship Sundays) – it’s a shift towards youth leading prime-time corporate worship for the whole, planning and delivering the worship alongside adults in a single group with shared and equal ownership of the worship service ... every Sunday morning of the year.

I want to be sure to clarify here that I’m representing what was presented in the session by someone else.  I don’t know how others will read this, but for me there’s a lot in this content that makes me want to curl up in the fetal position and hide myself from the sheer volume of intentional work that would be required for this to be lived out authentically by everyone, be they adult, youth, or minister.

The challenge put to us was to embrace the reality of our role as youth ministers in our contexts, and to understand that our roles are not about programming, pizza parties (yay for vicarious affirmation of my blog address), or curriculum.  How much focus do we put on the 90 minute miracle program, or the 40 minute hour on Sunday mornings?  Our role as youth ministers is to be creating spaces of communion in our congregations that are for the whole community, and to be ensuring that the invitation to that communion includes youth.

When we reduce it to a shiny church facebook page and a shiny youth group, we feed the desire to look elsewhere for intimate community.  Youth are looking to be known deeply by God in others, loved deeply, and incorporated into something bigger than themselves.

There is a difference between connection and communion.  Connection (affiliation) is rooted in a selective sociality – based on similarity of interests, usefulness, utility, and compatibility.  At it’s dirtiest, there’s almost a narcissism that underlies networked culture, a narcissism that asks “what value are you to me?” and “what value am I to my network?”

The church as communion is self-giving, and outwardly focused.  It doesn’t exist as a result of utility or brand, but rather it exists because of the grace of God.  Not only that, but in communion with one another, we are identified for who we truly are. Your congregation’s ecology is youth ministry … everyone in your congregation is doing youth ministry in liturgy and beyond it.  If church is about attending for an hour on Sunday morning then being separate and doing your own thing all week, we are teaching youth what it means to be the Body of Christ.

So, does (y)our congregation offer teenagers affiliation (connection, membership) with a group of Christians called the church?  OR  Does (y)our congregation live as a communion (oneness, koinonia) into which teens are involved?

And while you’re answering that, here’s what I’ll be wrestling with, in case you have any thoughts…

How might I assist our congregation:

            - to be a community of radical belonging; a community who incorporates the downtrodden

              and unattractive?

            - that extends reconciliation and forgiveness and which goes forth into the world together for

              the life of the world?

            - uses social media to extend offline relationships, and not merely to communicate “stuff”?

            - to not be cutting edge, but rather be authentic?

            - to foster creative space, not professional space (participatory vs consumer)?

            - to not let themselves be faceless to youth, and vice versa?

Networked Culture Part Deux - (from Wednesday January 25th)

Continuing from where the first networked community post left off, we started off our second session by considering the implications of the assertion by networked culture that tightly knit communities become a barrier to expanding our social horizons.  How problematic can this end up being when identity is crafted through fidelity to a community; finding a community to belong to, that imparts an ideology and recognizes you, that holds you and cares about you? 

Next we looked at the concept of  Extended Identity.  Extended identity involves a process of five steps:

            Looking inward

            Trying on

            Projecting

            Getting feedback

            Redefining

In a networked culture, your extended identity can be part expression, part mythic projection.  Consider how many teenagers actually photoshop their profile pictures before posting them on Facebook.  In looking at their extended identities, you can get a sense of who they would like to be; and that identity is not so much a “fake person” online, but rather online you see the person they either see themselves as, or aspire to be, in the “real world.”  This identity is put out into the network and receives feedback that can be processed away from the moment.  Over time, the characteristics projected that are received positively become less mythic and more real life.  In essence, if it gains approval from the network, it is incorporated into the teen in their daily life.  Considering the sheer amount of feedback possible, and the variety of far-removed people in the network providing it, this begs the question of whether caring adults should be affirming the characteristics being projected, or identifying the positive characteristics in the “real” teen that are missing in the extended identity.

While all of this is going on, teenagers are answering texts at 3 in the morning for fear of becoming irrelevant or removed from importance to the network.  From the outside it can appear to be addictive or compulsive behaviour.  Furthermore, they consciously or unconsciously begin presenting a curated self for a network audience that includes an emphasis on privacy, making sure only their best side is seen.  Over time, you start to see them using same pose(s) in every photo.

It seems to boil down to a process of personal branding; what is their individually unique style and value to the network?  How do they remain important and valuable in a network economy?  Theologically, this separates God’s calling from the mix – and runs in direct opposition to the question “what is my value in the economy of God’s grace?”  This personal branding is now 24 – 7 – 365 … in networked culture, we are always on, or we risk becoming irrelevant.

This is what passes for belonging in the network.  Teens get a sense of belonging from where they’re known.  Proximity in and of itself does not create intimate community.  In networked culture, it is possible to participate without the limitations of geographical boundaries; a sense that “wherever I go I can bring my friends with me.”  It is not uncommon to have teens sitting in a circle on Sunday morning, completely removed in all but proximity, finding belonging somewhere else on their smartphones.  The difficulty is that this removal from those in immediate proximity to experience belonging elsewhere in the network is as much a result of the reality that in church they may not be known at all.

           

Teenagers have a developmental need for social interaction.  It is for this reason that teens tend to be on the frontline of the constant drive to take technology and turn it social.  You can apparently find historical stories of teenagers breaking into telegraph offices to telegraph messages to teens who have broken into another telegraph office further away.  Technology provides the potential to foster presence in absence, and to bridge the broken relationships they see lived out in society around them.  Trace back far enough, and you come to the fig leaf: the first technology used to cover up relational disconnectedness (assuming you adopt the position of scriptural authority and biblical literalist).

We are becoming increasingly disconnected because of technology, mobility, and the pace of life.  In seeking intimacy – the deeply spiritual search for another who knows what it’s like to be me – we encounter a faceless face-to-face society.  Churches, schools, even homes are often faceless face-to-face experiences for teenagers.

And so churches today wrestle with technology … namely the epic battle between the Exclusion of Technology and the Inclusion of Technology.  Or as Andrew (the presenter) describes it, “the irrelevance of relevance.”  When they’re seeking intimacy in their relationships, they don’t care what your Facebook page looks like.  When they’re seeking to overcome the facelessness of society, they don’t care about the technology, but rather want what it promises – the ability to connect and find intimacy.

The ability to connect and find intimacy is something promised by both Facebook and the Eucharist.  Both are falling short of that promise.  The bread and wine technology is irrelevant if it isn’t delivering on the promise.  In church, teens are looking for communion with God and the people – the Body of Christ – but often are only finding weak connections.

As you can imagine, we all walked out quiet, broody, frustrated, and challenged … but it’s fair to note that, at least in the circle of people I continued the dialogue with over dinner, none of us were in essential disagreement with what was presented.

Dinner was a tough conversation …

What do you think about all this?

Beyond Doubting Alone - (from Tuesday January 24th)

Let’s start with the two research stats that framed my session on engaging the wavering faith of youth in doubt:

            70% of young people report they doubt their faith

            Less than 5% ever sit down and talk about it.

Wow!

This was the video our session opened with.

(Note: it contains some strong language.)

Newsflash – Doubt can be a pretty toxic problem when it isn’t expressed in a caring environment.  Did I hear her correctly?  She took away Christmas?

SO, what do we know about the 70%?  First, their doubts about their faith started as early as junior high school.  These doubts were not usually tied to church doctrine, but more tied to life circumstances.  Most of the 70% saw their doubts as beneficial to their faith in hindsight.  The nature of their doubts fell into four main categories (obviously with a great deal of variety within each category):

            - Does God exist?

            - Does God love me?

            - Am I living as, and doing what, God wants me to?

            - Is Christianity true / the only way to God?

We also know that the 70% described the times when they had doubts as traumatic; producing fear, anxiety, and insecurity.  We know their doubts lived out as a personal crisis; they didn’t just doubt God, but doubted themselves because of it.  An the unanimous consensus of the very large majority say that in their times of doubt, the church did not minister well; rarely even addressing it, and in the few instances when their doubts were addressed, the response was filled with platitudes.

The church has two primary responses to doubt:

1.) Pushing away – this response incorporates all the “you go sort out your doubts, I’ll pray for you, and we’ll be glad to welcome you back when you’ve figured it out” approaches.  It’s worth noting that even Martin Luther King Jr. experienced this approach when he openly doubted the resurrection in his youth group.  We also looked at some responses that were more congruent with quarantine protocols.

2.) Embrace – these are all the responses that draw the doubting teenager in, hold them close, but never actually address the doubts they’re having.  This tends to be because doubting is often treated as an apologetic issue, not a pastoral care issue.  It’s seen as a phase we all go through … but that approach is very much like watching someone fall out of a tree and break their arm, only to walk over to where they’re lying on the ground and tell them “Yeah I broke my arm once.  I remember how painful it was.  Don’t worry, you’ll heal up fine.”

The sad part is, both these responses end in the same result … the teenager doubts alone.

We spent a large part of the time working with actual case studies from the research.  There was a strong recurring theme that the congregation is responsible for the faith development of the person who doubts, not just when they have it all together.  This, of course, seems so obvious, yet we fail to live it out in our congregational contexts.

“Uncertainty is a wonderful reminder of that nagging little

detail I often forget, which is that I am not God.” — John Ortberg

How do we go about changing congregational culture to respond to this?  What do you think?

The Saint John's Bible (Tuesday, Jan 24 2012)

The session today on the Saint John’s Bible blew my mind.  Not going to lie.  It was cra~zy!  The Saint John's Bible is a work of art and a work of theology. A team of artists coordinated by Donald Jackson in Wales and a team of scholars in Central Minnesota have brought together the ancient techniques of calligraphy and illumination with an ecumenical Christian approach to the Bible rooted in Benedictine spirituality. The result is a living document and a monumental achievement.  This is the first undertaking of this sort by the church in 500 years.  It took a team of 6 calligraphists a combined time of 20 years to hand scribe every word alone!  Check it out!

We spent the session immersed in the artistic imagery found throughout the Saint John’s Bible.  It may interest you to know that each image is loaded with interfaith imagery and subtleties … every time we looked we caught something new that we had missed the first time.  I’m sure there’s still more to be found!  One of the artistic images is of the Earth from space (something that couldn't have been done 500 years ago!)  Every image was created by an ecumenical / interfaith team of artists and theologians.

The finished product will be seven volumes, bound in welsh oak, weighing a combined total of 350 pounds!  Imagine being a part of of monumental work like this, which will endure for over 500 years! 

I wanna touch it … can I touch it? … I really wanna touch it!

Networked Culture - (Tuesday, Jan 24 2012)

There will be at least two more posts on this topic during my time here at the Forums, since this relates to my week-long extended seminar during my time here.  So, let me start by unpacking a bunch of information to get you up to speed before I reflect and comment:

<Disclaimer: I’m at the Princeton Forums on Youth Ministry in Santa Barbara.  These numbers are obviously based on US research, but everything I’m posting here resonates as being comparable with what my assumptions and experience would indicate is  mirrored in Canadian teens!>

• 95% of US teens use the internet, compared to the 74% of adults who do

• There are 4.6 billion active cell phones in the world, and 75% of US teens have a cell phone
• 66% of teens text, averaging 50 received text messages and 40 sent text messages a day (or 2272 texts per month)
• 75% of those teens with cell phones have unlimited texting
• US teens are 7.5 times more likely to text (rather than call) someone
• The average text message in the US is 6.6 words long

• 80% of US teens use social networking sites like Facebook
• Facebook sits in second place behind only Google in the battle for internet dominance, but took over top spot in the world for weekly internet traffic in 2009
• Teens spend an average of 3 hours a day on Facebook

• 75% of teens watch YouTube
• Only 8% of teens use Twitter
• 97% of US teens play video games

• In 2009, Boston College ceased providing email accounts to its students due to a lack of use
• Today, US teens have the lowest email use of all age groups
• 37% of US teens say they “never, or can’t, send email.”

• Teens average 10.75 hours a day of “screen time,” and for much of that time they are engaged in social media

If you want to know more, watch this 4 minute video (fittingly provided by a social media site!):

Alright that’s probably enough with the information overload.  Let me start my musings with a quote from the seminar this morning:  “In networked culture, I create the network and the network creates me” (hence why this extended seminar is called Me Making We Making Me.)  Sitting in the seminar this morning, listening as we unpacked all of this information and data, James Earl Jones again showed up in my head (okay, he pretty much lurks in the shadows of my conscious mind, occasionally jumping out and hurling scripture at me).  This time, he was reading from 1Corinthians 12: 12-14:

“For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. For in the one Spirit we were all baptized into one body--Jews or Greeks, slaves or free--and we were all made to drink of one Spirit. Indeed, the body does not consist of one member but of many.” (NRSV)

I rely a great deal on social media, both in my personal day-to-day life, and also in my ministry.  I’m a social media junkie in many ways – a truth made clear to me being stranded in a San Francisco airport with no internet connection – but truth be told, I’ve never really reflected much on networked culture prior to arriving here.  I’m pretty sure most of us don’t consider the theological implications of a move away from community; a move toward a culture of networks.  So, understanding I’m still plugging through this myself, let me see if I can collect my thoughts into a coherent explanation of where I’m at…

In networked culture, I am the center, unlike in a culture of tight-knit communities.  I own the network, and I am at the heart of it all.  Think about it for a second; in my Facebook network, everybody is hand selected by me to be a “friend”.  While there are certainly overlaps on my friends list – people who know each other, and are potentially networked with each other through other networks – my network is a unique series of people who are not acquainted with the whole of my friends list.  In most cases, my friends list consists of people who will never meet.  This particular network exists because of me, which is why I am the center of it.  Without me, the network ceases to be.  This is in contrast to the idea of a tight-knit community such as a congregation, or peer group, or even a group of colleagues in a field of practice.

My network informs me.  If something is important, I’ll hear about it through my network eventually.  My network not only decides what is important, however.  It also becomes a kind of arbiter of what is true.

Here’s where it gets problematic, though.  My network is created by me.  Where a community is rooted in closeness – be it proximity, practice, or experience – a network can span vast distances.  Those in my network who actually ARE in close proximity are not in the network for that reason, but rather because I have carefully selected them.  My network recognizes and validates me, which is ironic when you consider that in a networked culture, I am the ‘performer’ and my network is my audience.  I perform and my network validates my performance and presence.

Theologically, the move away from community into networked culture begs another question; what about the community of the trinity? Or the Body of Christ?  Where do these exist in a networked culture?

What do you think about the move from close-knit communities to networked culture?  What do we gain or lose?  Are there any stats in this post that jump out at you?

(Intelligent?) Design Theory - (Also from Monday, Jan 23 2012)

My first elective session (“re:Designing your Youth Ministry”) was pretty engaging, I must say.  My concern heading into this session was that I would be hearing a presentation on a new youth ministry model that was “it” … “the best” … “the one.”  In a church culture that is panicking over the decline in numbers of young people in attendance, everyone seems to be looking around for the magic button to push to make everything alright.  Do this, and you’ll be packed with young people.  Buy a pool table.  Use this curriculum.  Hire this person. 

Anyone who’s been in ministry with youth (or ministry in general?) knows that there is no such thing as one universal template for ministry.  However, as we definitely got into during this session, our processes for discerning possible courses of action also get bogged down either by our own human tendencies, or by church structure.  Even a task as simple as a brainstorm can be hijacked easily, and with nobody realizing it has happened.

So the session today took a look at applying Design Theory principles to Practical Theology as a framework for honing our youth ministry.  Check out the video below.  It’s an 8 minute video that shows you the essential idea/process from a product design standpoint (not a ministry design standpoint).  I guarantee you won’t look at a shopping cart the same way again, and you will get some good laughs in the process!

Once the theory was unpacked, we gathered in smaller groups and set our minds to the task of solving the world’s problems … well, the church’s problems … okay, one problem expressed by a youth minister in our group who hails from Minnesota (“I can’t get any seniors from my congregation to participate in my ministry to youth”).  Even as a practice session, we had a huge amount of discussion that I don’t think ever would have come up in a different process.  I can’t imagine how freakingly awesome a real process would be for the church and its ministry.For me, the question is whether or not I could find the minds to sit around the table and get them committed to it.

So here’s the question for you … what do you think the biggest problem area is for the church’s ministry to young people?  Be specific!

In the beginning ... (From Monday, Jan 23 2012)

The theme for the Princeton Forums on Youth Ministry this year is “CREATE”.  Fittingly, our opening worship for the week centered opened with Genesis 1:1-2:

“In the beginning when God created the heavens and earth, the earth was a

 formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep,

while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters.” (NRSV)

There’s something about this particular biblical story (creation) that always stirs something in me.  When I close my eyes, and James Earl Jones’ booming bass starts reciting “In the beginning …” in my head, I start to feel very small, and as the days of creation continue on, I am always filled with a child-like sense of awe and wonder.  Genesis 1 reconnects me with the vastness of a creator God who spans the length and breadth of time and space, and whose skills as an artisan are unmatched.

The beauty of starting with the Genesis story of creation in worship today, is it gave permission for the worship leaders to not only incorporate creative arts into the worship, but to immerse it … infuse it.  Dance, painting, masks, pantomime, poetry, drama, and music provided by an awesome musical trio playing a variety of instruments (one I’ve never seen before!) were all flowing in and out of the worship experience from beginning to end.

Our table … altar … whatever you want to call it … changes and grows throughout the day.  Pieces are added and removed throughout our time together.  I managed to nab a photo of how it started off.  I’ll try to grab a few more throughout the coming days, without becoming a ‘tourist’ in our worship space.

I was worried showing up for worship after the frenzy of the last 14 hours; worried that perhaps I should have stayed a little longer at the hotel and settled myself so I could be truly present when I arrived later.  Turns out the worship service gave me the opportunity to bless the stresses of the trip and let them go.  I walked out of worship still tired, but feeling grounded and present and open to the week.  I’m excited to be here, and already (being the lone Canadian in attendance) I’ve been able to have some great conversation with some fine youth ministers.

Out of curiosity, what biblical passages stir up the awe and wonder in you?