7.06.2010

Rights of Passage: Challenge Camp

Today Shoreline's ministry to children is going to challenge camp! I'm going up tonight. We missed doing summer camp this year for middle school and high school, so this will be my summer camp fix for the year. In addition, I'm taking one of our all-star volunteers from middle school ministry with me in the car. Having Matthew with me will help redeem some of that driving time!

Passed thru Fire: Bringing Boys into Meaningful Manhood
Tonight after the summer camp dinner and service we will do a hay-ride out to a bonfire for all of our kids going into the 6th grade. We'll have a worship leader with a guitar out there and have a moment with them to mark the transition in their lives. Pastor Ken, the children's pastor here at Shoreline has been so great to work with these past few years. For quite some time we've been trying to think about the best way to transition families from children's ministry into youth ministry. This is a great first step. 

A couple of years ago I went to a breakout session about rights of passage at the YS National Youth Workers Convention. The Author, Rick Bundschuh taught that many of our problems in western culture stem from a lack of rights of passage. Young people are forced to mark their own path to adult hood. I learned that it's important for a community of adults to mark out a path to adulthood, articulate it to their young people, and then affirm when adults emerge from adolescence. Tonight is a nice start. After all, we are only transitioning them out of elementary school, but hopefully it will be a night that these kids look back on as one of the road markers on their way to growing up.

4 comments:

Lynn Marie Cherry said...

Ah, I love that you are going to camp. Michael will love seeing you there. He is at camp this week as Jesse's tech assistant! Love the new look!

Stacy McVane said...

I agree about the rights of passage. I remember to this day growing up in the Catholic church and participating in first communion and confirmation. It's an important part of growing up and it's great to be recognized for the growth as well.

The Hanique's said...

I remember my teenage years clearly. We had a really cool group and the volunteers were great. The things I remember most are the fun camps. And also our leaders gradually gave us more and more responsibility in all kinds of ways. They'd teach us something and then encourage us to do it ourselves. Great learning to take charge.

Unknown said...

Dr. Chap Clark wrote Hurt: Inside the heart of American Teenagers with phenomenal insights into the mess we find ourselves in today. He also has some interesting suggestions for first steps toward getting out of it.

If you are interested in this sort of thing I highly suggest any book by him or Christian Smith a researcher out of Notre Dame Universitiy in Indiana.

swidget