2smallcoins.org

If you have a spare four minutes, click over to NPR to hear an essay by Fr. Richard Rohr, OSF, on the centrality of mystery in our lives as Christians.  As we prepare ourselves to celebrate some of the ultimate mysteries of our faith; why an all-powerful God who created the heavens and the earth would care enough about you and me to send his only son into the world; how that limitless God could become human and be born into the world as a tiny baby; how one night some two-thousand years ago could forever change the world as we know it, I pray that you might take some time to allow yourself to be “utterly humbled before mystery.”

I will be taking some time off to be with my family this Christmas season, so updates to this blog and its parent site, 2smallcoins.org, will be sparse for the next week or so.  Know that you are in my prayers, and that (and I’m starting to feel like Mr. Rogers here, so I think I’ll just quote him) “I’ll be back, when the day is new.  You’ll have things you want to talk about.  I will too.”

Peace&Prayers,

cHRIS

Okay, so nobody seems keen to share their thoughts about the recent NCCYM, so I thought I’d share my own (I figure you’ll eventually get sick of reading what I have to say and start posting some comments of your own).

One thing that affirmed me - CatholicYouthMinistryDating.Com - maybe there’s hope for some of us yet! 

One thing that energized me - Mike Carotta’s concurrent session - “The Changing Reality of Youth Ministry.”  Mike gave us some great questions to consider about how we “do” youth ministry, in light of what we think we know about teenagers, what the proverbial “they” are telling us about teenagers, and what we can learn from the National Study on Youth and Religion.  This session reminded me that Renewing the Vision is due to celebrate it’s 10th birthday next summer.  It also really got me thinking about the psychology research concept of replication and how it applies to the NSYR data.

One thing that challenged me - we were reminded many times over those four days to pay attention to the things that made us uncomfortable.  For me that would have to be the final keynote address by Dr. Jamie Phelps, OP.  While I question the wisdom of offering this particular keynote on the last morning of the conference, I will admit that it has got me thinking about the degree to which I fall into patterns of institutional racism.  We’ve come so far, and we have so very far to go.

Okay, enough of that.  Now on to the next question.  If you could put one thing into a box that would be given to every brand-new youth ministry leader, what would it be?  Use the comment feature below and share your thoughts!

“The duty of a Christian is not to succeed, but to fail cheerfully.” - Robert Lewis Stevenson

Hey, Jesus, word to your mother.

Two in one afternoon - awesome! 

Number one - just heard about this on NPR as I was driving back to my office.  Check out “The Bible Experience.”  Samuel L. Jackson as the voice of God, I’m all about that!

Number two - just saw this on Scott Miller’s blog.  High-Larry-Us!  Check out Hand Motions in Heaven (from NCCYM 2006).

“The Lord called Samuel again, a third time.  And he got up and went to Eli, and said, “Here I am, for you called me.”  Then Eli perceived that the Lord was calling the boy.  Therefore Eli said to Samuel, “Go, lie down; and if he calls you, you shall say, “Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.”

Middle of the night - somebody calling your name - you look, nobody’s around.  What would your response have been?  Mine probably would have been something to the effect of “I don’t know who you are or what you think you’re doing, but if you don’t shut up and let me go back to sleep I’m gonna toss this alarm clock at your head.”

Maybe that’s why its taken me so long to get this site up and running.  I’ve felt the little nagging tug to do something like this for a long time, to give something back to the community and the profession that has given me so much.  To ask some questions that will hopefully spark some discussion.  To share my gifts, however simple they may be, and to encourage others to share their own.  So, that’s what this site is all about.  My hope is to use the blog portion of this site for the sparking of those discussions I mentioned just now.  My plan is to post a new question every week or so, and then sit back and see where the Spirit leads.  Since it was my experience at the recent National Conference on Catholic Youth Ministry that led me to finally start this site it seems fitting that the first question be about the NCCYM.  For those of you who were at the conference, what was one thing that affirmed you, one thing that energized you, and one thing that challenged you?  Use the comment feature below to share your thoughts.

And just so you can be thinking ahead (you over achiever, you) next week’s question will be:  if you could put one thing into a box that would be given to every brand-new youth ministry leader, what would it be?

Peace&Prayers,

cHRIS