The broad category is “Christian work with young people”. Primarily, it has meant:

1) Youth ministry, which has meant the evangelisation, discipling and equipping for mission of young people.  It has taken place within the local church, with the primary aspiration of drawing more young people into relationship with God and participation in the local church. To which I say, ‘Amen’! I became a youth worker through my participation in a church youth group. Because of the nurture I received, I was empowered to become a leader in the youth groups of this ministry, eventually taking the role of youth pastor.

2) Parachurch organisations such as YWAM, YCW, YFC, Scripture Union, chaplaincy bodies and Concern Australia do Christian work with young people, but they locate this work outside the context of the local church. In schools, prisons, homes, large youth events, the holiday season, drop-in centres and neighbourhoods, they often have similar aims to local church youth ministries. Though a sympathetic friend of the local church, their location ‘at arm’s length’ has created opportunities to utilise youth work philosophies & practices borrowed from social work agencies: employment programs; post-release initiatives; community development; counselling services etc.

3)  Another form of Christian work with young people is these social work agencies mentioned above. Many social work agencies in Australia have strongly Christian roots and still have connections to the denominations that birthed them. Christian youth work in these agencies is done by Christians who are not ‘professional Christians’ as in youth ministry or parachurches, but work with Christian inspiration and vision and see their work as a full expression of their Christian identity, with equal value as an ‘explicitly’ Christian worker.

4) Yet another form of Christian work with young people is expressed when local congregations release youth leaders to work primarily with young people outside, or marginal to, the congregation, with little or no expectation that this work will result in increased numbers of young people attending. Admittedly, this is rare, but it is an important innovation. It recognises the role of the local church in serving the local community, outside of any benefit to itself in terms of numbers. In this form, Christians working with young people are playing a similar role to parachurch workers, but with a significant difference – they have a strong and ongoing connection to the local church.

5)     One last form of Christian work with young people is that performed by people who are not Christians, but the character of their work can be affirmed as ‘in sympathy’ with the values of the Reign of God. How far such work can be affirmed is a thorny issue, but we need to at least acknowledge that such youth work is valuable, and to consider partnering where we can.

What are the winds that make this storm?

First, we have a rapidly ageing workforce, and a majority of the population will be beyond working age. Two major consequences flow from this: 1) that there will be less tax dollars to fund human services such as mental health, community development, youth work, family support etc; 2) a generation which is, in general, more likely to serve the community, is going to disappear soon.

Second, my wife came back from a work conference at which a Department of Human Services (DHS) senior bureaucrat foresaw the withering of the welfare sector as the financial crisis that is currently engulfing Europe inevitably finds its way to Australia. Funding to nonprofits and human services will be cut drastically, with the idea of the Big Society coming to the fore. The Big Society is a UK policy of devolution of responsibility for communities to the local level. Usually, I am all for a such a redistribution of power to the local level: it gives responsibility and ownership to people on the ground, who know what their community’s need. My first thought was – that’s great that the financial crisis has stimulated such a creative policy.

But then the crunch came.

Mark Sayers spoke at “Heartland”, a Christian youth work training event organised by Praxis and others in Bendigo. There, he mapped the cultural terrain that youth workers need to navigate. Mark’s main point is that youth and young adults approach life from a consumer perspective. That is, choices of all descriptions (phone, job, education, church, relationships) are re-framed in terms of what is good for the individual. The arena of decision-making has become the individual, rather than the community. Mark gave a rousing challenge to us there, to model wholehearted commitment to the cause of the reign of God.

You might be able to see the connections I’m making here. The factors of ageing population and financial crisis/Big Society require a new generation of people committed to the common good, who make decisions within that orbit rather than their personal needs. Great! But the pervasiveness of a consumerist worldview, across most of the population, means that people generally have a consumer approach to community service. I’ll do this homework club until I get bored; I’ll read to these kids until their parents frustrate me; I’ll visit the nursing home for as long as it’s ‘rewarding’; I’ll mentor those young people until I get a job offer interstate.  This consumer approach to community service doesn’t build a community, it undermines it. Let me say that this attitude is not limited to young people and young adults.

What is needed? A body of people committed to the wellbeing of others and the community beyond personal comfort, whose source of motivation comes from beyond what others can give me. Sounds like the Church. Jesus Christ’s outright denial of a culture of reciprocity, which consumerism relies on (I’ll buy this if it gets me that; I’ll participate if I get X), is the good soil in which commitment to the common good can be fostered. And here is where I get alternately despondent and hopeful. On the one hand, the Church is withering away in Australia, and its numerically successful instances often rely on consumerism. On the other hand, there is a new movement of Christians excited about mission, pouring energy into their neighbours, schools, workplaces and communal institutions – that gives me courage!

However, if this ethic of community service doesn’t get passed on, and if the Church’s better angels don’t win out, and if the welfare sector we have contracted to do our dirty work for us is simply not there to hold back the tide, what’s going to happen? Wholesale breakdown of society. I’m not usually given to hyperbole, but I don’t see another option. Feel free to provide a more hopeful one.

In that day, the oddest book in the Bible, Revelation, will become eerily sensible. When humanity is stripped bare, when all the props have been knocked out, all that we have left is “patient endurance”. The book of Revelation advocates that the Church be the Church – if we allow God to shape us into that Church, there’s some hope.

I played music by Eddie Vedder, Steve Bevis, Michael Franti, Ben Harper, U2, Paul Kelly, Shane Howard, Kev Carmody, Billy Bragg, Surrender

Australian Christian Lobby Forum – Wednesday 17th November at Bendigo Baptist, 7.30pm.

TEAR Gift Catalogue

Gordon Preece Seminar

At the same time, I was asked to speak at the AGM of the Bendigo Chaplaincy Committee, a band of stalwarts who support the various chaplains in Bendigo. Here’s part of what I said, and you can read the whole speech here:

Charles Taylor, author of “A Secular Age”, puts it like this:

The shift to secularity…consists…of a move from a society where belief in God is unchallenged and indeed, unproblematic, to one in which it is understood to be one option among others, and frequently not the easiest to embrace.

Our culture’s whole approach to religion has changed: in our public spaces, in our individual beliefs, and in the soil in which faith takes root. Most of us are conscious of these changes, but our minds haven’t caught up with the reality. So, in some way, our minds still operate in the past, where God was central. But the rest of our culture is living in a different world.

What do these changes mean for chaplains? Chaplains mostly know these things – I’m saying them because chaplains rely on us, and we need to have a realistic view of the context they work in, and realistic expectations of what they can achieve.

1. God and public space: Chaplains used to occupy public space in schools through sermons at Easter and Christmas, Christian reflections in school newsletters and the like. As a teenager at a state school, I clearly remember the chaplain preaching at Easter and Christmas, and as a primary school student, being taken to the local church for an Easter service. Now, it’s becoming rarer for chaplains to give a Christian message at state school assemblies, as was once common. We can’t expect our chaplains to publicly proclaim the Christian message in compulsory school activities. We can’t expect Christians to be given privileged access to schools simply because we are Christians. That time is going and will soon disappear.
2. Individual Belief and Practice: when few people believe or practice a religion, is there a place for chaplains to foster religious practice in schools? When parents are not religious themselves, is it ethical for a chaplain to encourage religious practice in young people and children? In any case, chaplains are not building on a foundation of familiarity with the stories of Abraham & Jesus. More likely they are confronting an ignorance of these. We can’t expect chaplains to spend lots of time discipling young people, producing biblically literate young people
3. The atmosphere of belief: it is difficult for chaplains to encourage belief in a context where belief is now seen as odd, and unsupported by the majority of institutions in our country. Chaplains now have to rediscover what it means to create soil in which the seeds of faith can grow. That is a hard task, because we haven’t had to do it before.

Interestingly, quite a few people said they didn’t want to give regularly, but that if Seeds Bendigo had a particular need, they would consider it – and they told me to put it on my website…so, you asked for it! A list of the things you could give ($$ and otherwise) to the work of Seeds!

• $500 for fruit trees for the Hope…It Grows! garden
• $500 to install a desk to accommodate the extra people working at St Matthew’s
• $200 for pavers for paths
• a pergola!
• $800 for a sculpture in grounds of St Matthew’s
• a crane to dispose of an old shed
• a 3 x 3m workshed

There’s a start! Feel free to contribute some or all of these costs. You can donate at http://www.givenow.com.au/saltbushinc or by emailing me at davefagg@optusnet.com.au

Even though I know he is in improved circumstances, I feel a wave of frustration rise and fall. What is the use of building relationships when they are constantly eroded by transience? I have, many years ago, resolved that long-term relationships were necessary to unveil the reign of God, whether among the poor or whoever. I had decided that speaking out the good news needed to happen on the platform of trust and respect.

But it’s a lonely stance. Often, those we relate to want to move on to something else quickly. This is the case whether we are among the poor who want to rapidly escape, or among the general population for whom the next best thing can’t arrive too soon.

How do we deal with transience, when our theology inspires us to grounded lives and longevity?

Here’s a couple of ideas:
(1) We rid ourselves of any heroism: our desire to be the ‘key’ people in others’ transformation can cripple us when we no longer have the opportunity to be that ‘significant’ person.

(2) We re-member ourselves: “re-membering” is recalling the fact that we are members of a body, a movement, a people that is far-spread. We, as individuals, are not it. That should give us some hope in the face of transience. As the biblical saying goes: some sow, others reap, and we enter into each others’ labour. When we can no longer be a part of a person’s life, someone else will take up the labour.

(3) We recall the Trinity: relational mission struggles with the tension of ends and means. Is the relationship for the purpose of more effective evangelism, or so that the person will have a better life? Or is it simply for the sake of the relationship? I don’t think there is an answer to this one, but in the face of transience we need to remember the Trinity; the Godhead in which relationship is essential to the character of God.

I’m not going to give it to you because this post is not about the rightness of the sentence (the young man is obviously a danger to others) but about the media’s role. The newspaper is tabloid-sized, and this story completely covered the front page with a photo of the man, plus his name in the headline. I realise that, given he is 18 and had pleaded guilty, his face and name can be published. The newspaper acted legally, but did they act ethically?

As we go beyond the headlines, we find that this man’s father was killed in a car accident 10 years ago. Suddenly he transforms in our eyes from a 19 year old hoon to a 9 year old boy discovering his father is no longer alive. Any superficial study of youth development tells us that parents, particularly fathers, are key to a young boy becoming a responsible adult. A $65,000 payout from the TAC was put in a trust fund after this accident. At age 18, the boy promptly wasted it in a predictable stream of prodigality. I think we can confidently assume that this boy has not had the opportunity to develop in a healthy way.

This newspaper’s actions are unethical. There is no public benefit served in publishing this story in this way.  There is no benefit to the man found guilty. There is no deterrent effect, because any other so-called ‘hoon’ will see this as a special case because of his father’s death. The only effect is to stir up ill-feeling towards young people. Of course, this is not an isolated occurrence in the media. Young people doing stupid & criminal things are constantly in the news. In youth and social work this is called a ‘deficit approach’, in which the media chooses to highlight negative characteristics of young people. On page 13 of the same newspaper, Father Chris Riley (right) from Youth off the Streets spoke to 300 young people about leadership and character….putting that on the front page would have been fantastic.

Publishing this story is legitimate, but allow an obviously damaged young person the privacy needed to rehabilitate.

In one sense, I am glad that someone has been caught. The stupidity and malice of lighting a fire on that day is obvious, and I still recall with fear making my home safe and helping neighbours as the fire burned in Long Gully.

The lives are lost, the houses are burned, the land is scorched. Those things have happened and cannot be undone. People are rebuilding their homes and communities are licking their wounds together, and beginning to recover. It has been a time of unprecedented cooperation, imbued with a generous spirit.

As well as being a Long Gully resident, I am also a youth worker. I know many of the local young people, and their families, and I am checking through them in my mind, wondering if it is one of them. The condemnation that will rain down upon them and their families will be harsh.

As these 2 young people come to the Bendigo courthouse today, I pray that a spirit of pity would be there. It would be easy for us to persecute, rather than simply prosecute, these 2 young people.

Hear me clearly; if they are found guilty, they deserve punishment. Justice must be done. But it needs to be the kind of punishment, and the kind of justice, that restores them as full members of our community, with a sense of responsibility and care towards it, so that they may never again harm our community. If we persecute and punish them beyond repair, they will hurt others in return. Somehow, we need to discipline with love, a difficult task but we have seen the courage and strength that Victorians have. Let us bring that same courage and strength to our enemies.

Missionaries need to talk over people. Regularly. Frequently. With godly vigour and fervour. I’ve been through some soul-searching over this one, people, but the kingdom of God requires rudeness beyond measure, inconsideration like we have never dreamed of. Yes, we need to start interrupting monologues with witty comments and jokes. Brothers and sisters, divert the flow of verbal sewerage into the decontamination plant of conversational purity with well-placed questions. Ah yes, even questions that have nothing to do with the conversation whatsoever. Place a gag in those overworked gums of that child of God, fill that space where they drew breath with a barrage of your own trivial stories…

Well, maybe I got a bit sweaty about that one, a little extreme. So, in the interests of paradoxical truth, let me know speak of the opposite. Keeping my trap shut is a lovely phrase, which I’ve never thought about until now. ‘Trap’ being my mouth….now that’s an intriguing metaphor. What does my mouth entrap exactly? Most of the time, myself. Little wonder that short passage in James has become so famous.

Yet, I feel strangely unmotivated writing about shutting up and letting someone else talk. ‘Being a good listener’ has become such a part of “good” Christian identity that I am loathe to add to the mass, or morass, of verbosity about why we should listen and how we should listen and that listening to people’s stories will change the world. It’s all so…polite, which is probably why I vented my spleen previously.

But, I will manfully try to justify why keeping your trap shut is a missionary virtue:

• I don’t often have anything useful to say: in mission, you will often befriend people who are in pain. They may be isolated, unemployed, ill, mentally unwell, oppressed, abused, dirt poor; often simultaneously.  I haven’t experienced this kind of enduring multiplicity of pain, my daily experience of hardship being lack of chocolate. Talking much in the face of this pain is harmful; the best we can do is make sure they know we’re listening

• When I do have something useful to say, it doesn’t need many words: in graced moments, the right thing worms it way through thickets of useless platitudes. Our words and the situation of the person happily congeal. When this happens, stop. Keep your trap shut. Say your bit and don’t wreck it by (my personal downfall) repeating the same truth in 3 other ways.

Well, that’s about all I can think of at the moment.

For those of you who know me a bit, you will have heard me rave about “The Social Entrepeneur”, a book by Andrew Mawson, an English clergyman who turned his decrepit church into a centre for social enterprises – initiatives that are based on the following principle:

We know that every human being has a unique talent. By applying these talents in local communities it is possible to make them strong and vibrant instead of soulless and “deprived”. What matters is backing people before structures.

Andrew sought out people in his disadvantaged area who were passionate about an idea, and supported them to get it going as a business. I cried when I read his book. It wasn’t sad, rather the joy and hope that sang through his stories got to my heart. He was describing truly Christian community development.

Welfare Mentality vs Social Entrepreneurship
One of the sad things about Christian community work is that it often gets dependent on handouts, just like the people it aims to serve. Once dependent, we stick with programs that will ensure the transfusion of funds that we need. We eventually find we have strayed from our original purpose. We internalise the same Welfare Mentality that afflicts many of those we serve and become unable to break free of its bonds.

Social Entrepreneurship rejects this way of being and working. It starts with what people are passionate about, not what gains funding. It supports that passion, but always with the aim of self-sufficiency. I think this is incredibly important in poorer communities, because independence from outside help breeds confidence, dignity, responsibility and generosity. The constant supply of government benefits, cheaper housing, food handouts etc breeds apathy, boredom and self-loathing.

The Kingdom & Social Entrepreneurship
The links between God’s reign and social entrepreneurship need to be teased out. But some preliminary thoughts are:

• God created humans with passions and desires to create. Social Entrepreneurship taps into those passions and desires, whereas Welfare Mentality drains passion and desire from a person.
• Dependence, as in Welfare Mentality, is the flip side of domination. God did not create people to be dependent on others, but interdependent. Social Entrepreneurship enables people, especially the poor, to contribute to others as well as receive.
• God created humans with the need to give. Welfare Mentality focusses on receiving, which makes us bloated and unhealthy. The gospel motivates us to give, and when we do we find that feel more human than ever.

More to think about here…

But for now, if in Geelong go to Urban Bean, and if you want to support Bike Butcher, buy a cool fixie.