school youth group Posts

• In Japan Half The Top Selling Books Are Written On Mobile Phones
  Half of the top ten selling works of fiction in the first six months of 2007 were composed on mobile phones... Mobile phone novels... have become a publishing phenomenon in Japan, “turning middle-of-the-road publishing houses into major concerns."
  (tags: publishing)
• "Why can’t we be Friends?", Kirk W finds Quaker video on YouTube
  It’s a good mix of earnest effort and teenage humor. They’ve got the Quaker Oats gag in there (several times) but they manage to get past that. They even have some of our Friends in it.
  (tags: comment)
• Video: Quakers Rock (via QuakerQuaker.org)
  High school history project video . "Why the Quakers in the Middle Colonies of the Colonial Era were better,.. a very funny film staring superspeed native beating and a transvestite Scarlett O'Hara." Warning: Oat jokes, non-PC humor. (via Kirk W)
  (tags: quaker quaker.youth quaker.depictions)
• Peter B on reading Marcus Borg on reading the Bible
  That’s me in a nutshell—my personal faith and practice in five simple sentences—and the first bit could just as well have been a quote from George Fox with the language updated and the thee’s and thou’s taken out.
  (tags: quaker quaker.liberal quaker.christianity)
• Sheffield Gordon on the relationship of individual and community
  If we fail to make the distinction between community, fellowship and friendship [then] we will allow ourselves to become subsumed into the overwhelming individualism of our age, and we will become merely another political action group.
  (tags: quaker quaker.witness)
• Six Apart sells its LiveJournal service to the Russians
  "The company continues to lead in the blogging and social media industry with the Movable Type Publishing Platform, the TypePad hosted blogging service, and Vox, a free blogging service for friends and families."
  (tags: tech tech.movabletype)

• Blog: Quaker school changed my life (via QuakerQuaker.org)
  For the brilliant training that I recieved, I will always be grateful to the Quakers. They rescued me from a dim and drearly life, from isolation and affluence, into the powerful world of service and spirit.
  (tags: quaker.youth quaker)
• Sheffielder Craig B on Quaker save spaces vs a Quaker way
  "For many people the Quaker Meeting is primarily a 'safe space' - a place to be themselves, where they will be accepted ... without expectations or demands.... But for me there is something missing from this image.
  (tags: quaker quaker.liberal)
• Jez gathering in outside public worship in Hyde Park
  "It might not seem like much, especially if you've attended silent peace vigils, but taking your faith and way of meeting into the open, offering it up for view and possibly ridicule is a big step."
  (tags: quaker quaker.outreach)
• Qr Oats Cherice wonders about a Quaker response to immigration issues
  "What do you all think about this situation? Should we as Friends do something about the immigration issue? If so, what? If someone is an illegal immigrant, how should we help them? Should we break the law?"
  (tags: quaker quaker.witness)
• Brent Bill's worship sharing group looks at spiritual community
  "Does a spiritual community differ from a social community because instead of human-to-human relationships it is based on human-to-God-to-human relationships? Is it based on "a call" to join the group? Is it covenantal in nature?.."
  (tags: quaker quaker.community)

Over at the BarclayPress site there are a number of great articles on emergent church from the perspective of Evangelical Friends

A Guest Piece from 'Quakerspeak' Claire Reddy.

"As young Friends move through high school and enter the [young] adult world, there is often a general lack of communication between young Friends and adults in Meetings, as if there’s some tension about it... As the only active young Friend at my school (I'm sort of the 'token' Quaker around), I usually do not have anyone to talk to about my spiritual findings and leadings. As I have continued to develop spiritually, I find more and more I need other Friends to talk who are familiar with my struggles."

I was given permission to pass along this data from the FGC-sponsored Youth Ministry Consultation that took place Third Month. A number of goals and projects had been brainstormed beforehand. The thirty-or-so participants at the Consultation were each given ten stars, which they were asked to put next to the projects they thought should be pursued. Every star acted as a vote that there was one person interested in that topic. The stars were coded to indicate the age range of the voter: High-Schooler, Adult Young Friend (18-37 years old) and older Friends.

Jordan Cooper has been summarizing a new book by Reggie McNeil called "The Present Future: Six Tough Questions for the Church." There are some interesting observations about Gen-Xers. I'd say that the only thing more worrisome than young believers being ignored is young believers suddently being noticed (more on this--much more--soon).

Incremental vs. Prophetic

Since I've written a lot about young adult minstry among Quakers I feel obligated to post the address of a new Yahoo group about the topic, focused on high school youth. I really don't feel led to contribute. No one there is looking at root causes for the crisis in youth retention. The suggestions for improvement offered so far are incremental when what's wrong is fundamental: deep-rooted institutional ageism and a fear of a robust and challenging prophetic ministry. There is hope for youth ministry among liberal Friends but I don't think it will come from this quarter. Still, it's worth checking out and some Quaker Ranter readers might want to join in the discussion.