If this comment causes too much friction I'll delete it if you don't do it first. I have been observing some things lately in my own parish and am trying to wrap my brain around the problem and see if anything can be done. I'm a convert, and I've been orthodox about 5 years now. My family joined the church because we really needed Jesus, and He led a priest and his wife to reach out a hand to us. That said, I understand that I have no authority to stand on in making this comment but I'm going to do it anyway.
What I've observed, both in seeing new people flood into the Church recently AND in my own journey to being a member of the church (which I never was growing up, by the way, not in ANY church), is that any attempts at piety are laughed at, scorned, and called "convertitis" by the initiated, by those who grew up in the church, or those converted so long ago that they may as well be cradle Orthodox. I've even heard it from clergy. Oh, she's wearing a long skirt and headscarf? How culty! Must be one of THOSE people. Why can't she just be like the rest of us? Fasting? Evening prayers? Who actually does that? That's cute, give it a few years and we'll see. Or, God forbid, you kindly ask someone to stop talking during the readings of the scripture, your convertitis is showing.
I've seen grown adults who have been Orthodox their entire lives actively distracting infant and toddler children who were being perfectly quiet before from the reading of the Gospel by talking to them! Those are formative experiences that are going to shape the way that child interacts with the church, and what you're teaching them right now is that they are more important than the very Gospel, the proclamation that Christ Jesus has defeated death! So if that's the case, of course they're going to think it's unimportant. They're going to think church is a social club, that it's all about them - and once they get older, they're going to find a better social club with less rules. Especially if you subscribe to the "prayer and fasting is for converts" and effectively divide your life between "Christianity for a few hours most Sundays" and "The real world" which is driven by secular desire for wealth, power and pleasure.
There's a serious disconnect somewhere that's causing this. My reason for wanting to be in church and to hear the Gospel and attend weekday service has nothing to do with Rad-Trad behavior - in fact, I find that particular subculture quite irritating but try not to judge - and has everything to do with remembering life before the church. My whole family, including my teenage daughter, remembers very clearly how a house blessing and nightly prayer changed our lives, saved us from despair, and we don't want to go back to that. But we also don't appreciate being treated like we're taking the Faith "too seriously." Yes, my family attends most of the services our parish offers, we try to keep the fasts, and yes, my daughter and I wear head scarves and long skirts in church. Why? Because the priest who drove 3½ hours to bless the home of some semi-pagan miscreants told us that, if we wanted to try to keep faith, we should pray every morning and every night, attend church as much as possible, and that ladies (and men, frankly) were expected to dress a certain way in a house of prayer as part of an effort to reorient oneself toward prayer and worship. And this priest was Russian, so yes, headscarves. So, we listened to him.
All of this is to say that if youth ministry isn't focused on educating young people about our beautiful theology, the reasons we do what we do, WHY we're expected to behave and dress certain ways, and does not encourage prayer, fasting, and mindfulness, and doesn't focus on all of the absolute treasure we inherit from our faith, in terms they can understand - of course they're going to leave the church. We've given them no reason to stay, and certainly haven't directed them to Christ. We can't align our lives with the secular garbage being tossed at us in every direction and expect children to see any value in attending church. We really have to try to live as Christians outside of 2 hours on Sunday and really talk to our kids about God. We have to lovingly and kindly have expectations of them, and we have to lovingly and kindly help them live up to those expectations, and help them up when they fall, just like the rest of us. We can't let the world dictate our schedules and our motives and then cry that our kids are rebelling against the church as soon as we let them out of our sight. We can't sit there talking to them during the Gospel reading of they're sitting there quietly engaging with it the way only children do. We also can't expect them to be perfect little youth club robots. We have to somehow get past our own sinfulness and failure, and bring them to God.
This all makes so much sense. I want to suggest however an over-emphasis on the institutionalization of young people as the core problem. And this is simply because all the programs you talk about that Catherine participated in - that mountain of ministry stuff - is not present in many many parishes. Bigger parishes have those things to offer, most small - medium sized parishes have some to none of that to offer. But the young people in those parishes are becoming disenchanted or disengaged just the same. I don’t believe the core of the problem can be categorized as institutionalization across the board because that isn’t the experience of many (I almost want to say most based on my own experience) young people. Those young people never felt a part of ANY group other than the community itself and are equally disconnected. However the solutions, as you suggest, lie below all that, at the point where we’ve failed to help them develop their true, real relationship with Christ and find their true, real place in the Body of Christ. That is where we’re missing the mark whether they’ve had the opportunity to participate in youth groups and learn from formal church school curricula or not.
Good analysis and a little scary. I just read where Saint Porphyrios said to stop praising children but rather encourage them to ask God for His help in using their talents successfully. I daresay prayer is where our relationship with God and His saints is really activated. And, after all, who is better equipped to pray his way through the day than an Orthodox Christian with the Jesus Prayer?
Reading these words is like looking in a mirror that describes to a T how we were raised, and raised
our children, doing all the "right things" without realizing all along that we didn't "know Christ", not in the way that He wants us to be, icons in His Image.
This hit home for me when I heard a priest this past winter say that he asked his Sunday school kids what Christmas is all about, and they had to be prompted to answer "Jesus." Your article here adds another level of conviction and I like the simple question to evaluate what we do. "Does this make sense without Christ?" Thanks, Steve.
Outstanding article, Steve! Remembering my Catholic childhood, I can tell you that *kids won't ask.* I was aching for our teachers to tell us anything about Christ. They always stopped short. It's a brave, brave 13 year old who raises her hand, in front of whole group, to say, "Tell us about Jesus." Not me! I doubt my teachers would have known what to say. But I, since I was 10, *wanted to know*!
So much to say and so little space. I encountered what you described with myself and both of my kids. I nodded through your entire blog. I submit, however, that our problem is not unique to us. It is evident throughout the West because we separate our faith from our lives, we work in a secular material world, and "God talk" is suspicious because it is often hijacked with monetary and political motivations. Also, though I understand you disagree with the three statements you made in your intro, I would submit something you did not mention: Orthodoxy is incompatible in a legally secular nation-state such as anywhere west of Greece/Bulgaria/Romania. Despite the brave talk of converts and seekers, the phyletism of the Orthodox churches and their inability to compete with Protestants or even Catholics like the Jesuits, destroys whatever chance of placing a permanent foundation.
If this comment causes too much friction I'll delete it if you don't do it first. I have been observing some things lately in my own parish and am trying to wrap my brain around the problem and see if anything can be done. I'm a convert, and I've been orthodox about 5 years now. My family joined the church because we really needed Jesus, and He led a priest and his wife to reach out a hand to us. That said, I understand that I have no authority to stand on in making this comment but I'm going to do it anyway.
What I've observed, both in seeing new people flood into the Church recently AND in my own journey to being a member of the church (which I never was growing up, by the way, not in ANY church), is that any attempts at piety are laughed at, scorned, and called "convertitis" by the initiated, by those who grew up in the church, or those converted so long ago that they may as well be cradle Orthodox. I've even heard it from clergy. Oh, she's wearing a long skirt and headscarf? How culty! Must be one of THOSE people. Why can't she just be like the rest of us? Fasting? Evening prayers? Who actually does that? That's cute, give it a few years and we'll see. Or, God forbid, you kindly ask someone to stop talking during the readings of the scripture, your convertitis is showing.
I've seen grown adults who have been Orthodox their entire lives actively distracting infant and toddler children who were being perfectly quiet before from the reading of the Gospel by talking to them! Those are formative experiences that are going to shape the way that child interacts with the church, and what you're teaching them right now is that they are more important than the very Gospel, the proclamation that Christ Jesus has defeated death! So if that's the case, of course they're going to think it's unimportant. They're going to think church is a social club, that it's all about them - and once they get older, they're going to find a better social club with less rules. Especially if you subscribe to the "prayer and fasting is for converts" and effectively divide your life between "Christianity for a few hours most Sundays" and "The real world" which is driven by secular desire for wealth, power and pleasure.
There's a serious disconnect somewhere that's causing this. My reason for wanting to be in church and to hear the Gospel and attend weekday service has nothing to do with Rad-Trad behavior - in fact, I find that particular subculture quite irritating but try not to judge - and has everything to do with remembering life before the church. My whole family, including my teenage daughter, remembers very clearly how a house blessing and nightly prayer changed our lives, saved us from despair, and we don't want to go back to that. But we also don't appreciate being treated like we're taking the Faith "too seriously." Yes, my family attends most of the services our parish offers, we try to keep the fasts, and yes, my daughter and I wear head scarves and long skirts in church. Why? Because the priest who drove 3½ hours to bless the home of some semi-pagan miscreants told us that, if we wanted to try to keep faith, we should pray every morning and every night, attend church as much as possible, and that ladies (and men, frankly) were expected to dress a certain way in a house of prayer as part of an effort to reorient oneself toward prayer and worship. And this priest was Russian, so yes, headscarves. So, we listened to him.
All of this is to say that if youth ministry isn't focused on educating young people about our beautiful theology, the reasons we do what we do, WHY we're expected to behave and dress certain ways, and does not encourage prayer, fasting, and mindfulness, and doesn't focus on all of the absolute treasure we inherit from our faith, in terms they can understand - of course they're going to leave the church. We've given them no reason to stay, and certainly haven't directed them to Christ. We can't align our lives with the secular garbage being tossed at us in every direction and expect children to see any value in attending church. We really have to try to live as Christians outside of 2 hours on Sunday and really talk to our kids about God. We have to lovingly and kindly have expectations of them, and we have to lovingly and kindly help them live up to those expectations, and help them up when they fall, just like the rest of us. We can't let the world dictate our schedules and our motives and then cry that our kids are rebelling against the church as soon as we let them out of our sight. We can't sit there talking to them during the Gospel reading of they're sitting there quietly engaging with it the way only children do. We also can't expect them to be perfect little youth club robots. We have to somehow get past our own sinfulness and failure, and bring them to God.
May God help us all.
This all makes so much sense. I want to suggest however an over-emphasis on the institutionalization of young people as the core problem. And this is simply because all the programs you talk about that Catherine participated in - that mountain of ministry stuff - is not present in many many parishes. Bigger parishes have those things to offer, most small - medium sized parishes have some to none of that to offer. But the young people in those parishes are becoming disenchanted or disengaged just the same. I don’t believe the core of the problem can be categorized as institutionalization across the board because that isn’t the experience of many (I almost want to say most based on my own experience) young people. Those young people never felt a part of ANY group other than the community itself and are equally disconnected. However the solutions, as you suggest, lie below all that, at the point where we’ve failed to help them develop their true, real relationship with Christ and find their true, real place in the Body of Christ. That is where we’re missing the mark whether they’ve had the opportunity to participate in youth groups and learn from formal church school curricula or not.
Good analysis and a little scary. I just read where Saint Porphyrios said to stop praising children but rather encourage them to ask God for His help in using their talents successfully. I daresay prayer is where our relationship with God and His saints is really activated. And, after all, who is better equipped to pray his way through the day than an Orthodox Christian with the Jesus Prayer?
Reading these words is like looking in a mirror that describes to a T how we were raised, and raised
our children, doing all the "right things" without realizing all along that we didn't "know Christ", not in the way that He wants us to be, icons in His Image.
This hit home for me when I heard a priest this past winter say that he asked his Sunday school kids what Christmas is all about, and they had to be prompted to answer "Jesus." Your article here adds another level of conviction and I like the simple question to evaluate what we do. "Does this make sense without Christ?" Thanks, Steve.
Great message, Steve. Thanks for sharing.
Outstanding article, Steve! Remembering my Catholic childhood, I can tell you that *kids won't ask.* I was aching for our teachers to tell us anything about Christ. They always stopped short. It's a brave, brave 13 year old who raises her hand, in front of whole group, to say, "Tell us about Jesus." Not me! I doubt my teachers would have known what to say. But I, since I was 10, *wanted to know*!
So much to say and so little space. I encountered what you described with myself and both of my kids. I nodded through your entire blog. I submit, however, that our problem is not unique to us. It is evident throughout the West because we separate our faith from our lives, we work in a secular material world, and "God talk" is suspicious because it is often hijacked with monetary and political motivations. Also, though I understand you disagree with the three statements you made in your intro, I would submit something you did not mention: Orthodoxy is incompatible in a legally secular nation-state such as anywhere west of Greece/Bulgaria/Romania. Despite the brave talk of converts and seekers, the phyletism of the Orthodox churches and their inability to compete with Protestants or even Catholics like the Jesuits, destroys whatever chance of placing a permanent foundation.