Youth

[presbyter]

Now what have these people got that we have not?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/4677440.stm

Yet what we have got is so much more! How do we get it over?

[Merseysider]

Now what have these people got that we have not?

Some of the most appalling music ever written/recorded. Did you see the Songs of Praise they did recently?

[presbyter]

No I didn't see. Are there any samples on the internet?
Why are youth flocking to it if it is so bad?

[dunstan]

Why are youth flocking to it if it is so bad?

Because older people with better taste know better?

[docmattc]

Why are youth flocking to it if it is so bad?

Because it meets them where they are at. Whether it leads them anywhere is another matter. We loose out because we expect the young to meet us where we're at.

Because older people with better taste know better?

I think this is why we loose our youth. We older people with different taste can impose our taste on the young, telling them that we know better. The young feel completely disenfranchised and leave. Yes, we have to form our youth- I'm not advocating that anything goes- but telling them that we know better and our musical taste is superior to theirs is a surefire way to achieve empty churches in a few years time.

Some of the most appalling music ever written/recorded.

Some of it yes, but by no means all. Our Catholic composers manage to write some drivel too. Some of it is actually quite good and works in our understanding of a liturgical setting, if its played to accompany a congregation and not to entertain the audience at a concert. All too often we hear the latter because of the type of denomination that uses this music. I know someone who goes to such a church and he seems to judge the quality of the service by how much AV kit has been used.

When I was involved in University Chaplaincy work we used tonnes of this sort of music, as well as Haas, Haugen, Lawton etc, and with a congregation mostly under 25 (so presumably too young to have any sense of taste). We used it because it engaged them.

In my parish, our music group (and even the organist) play "My Jesus, my Saviour" from Hillsong and the congregation love it, including those older people who apparently should have better taste. In fact it was first requested by a member of the choir who is in her sixties.

We should be looking to learn something from churches that are packed with young people, not dismissing them. Some of their music is awful, by our taste, and we might not agree with their theology. That doesn't alter the fact that they are packed with young people, my church isn't and I doubt whether Dunstan's or Merseysider's are either.

[dunstan]

My tongue was firmly in cheek when making that comment.

I think we are getting into difficult territory when we consider that appealing to specific tastes is as important as liturgical inteegrity. It is essential that sacred music should be, well, sacred, and to embrace the mundane because it appeals at a superficial level is a slippery slope down which I don't want to go.

I'm not alone in this view.

[johnquinn39]

No I didn't see. Are there any samples on the internet?
Why are youth flocking to it if it is so bad?

The success may be due to the familiarity of the musical idiom which has enabled the recognition of Christ in his word, and in his song.
Perhaps part of the RC problem is that we have often simply not allowed this to happen - so often the mic is switched off or singing and music-making are forbidden at Mass.
Hillsong music is not altogether bad. Okay, I claim and interest here, as part of my job involves supplying CCM cd's including Hillsong. I also occasionaly set psalms in CCM idiom when I play for 10.30 Mass.
Some CCM is no worse than the functional psalm and Mass settings that appear in RC publications. Some is better. Many of the texts are utterly superior to the original "hymn" texts that unfortunately appear in RC hymn books. It is such a pity that the superb texts and music of Bernadette Farrell and Marty Haugen are not taught to the young, but nonsense is.
A possible solution to our problem may be to acknowledge the validity of the Pop/Rock/Soul idiom and maybe pay musicians.
Also, why not make RC music available on cd or dvd?
Rome may well change all our texts in the future, but does this matter? If we sing scripture, we are singing Christ, and if this leads us to go out and live and pray these words, we cannot go wrong.

[presbyter]

The success may be due to the familiarity of the musical idiom.....

http://www.hillsong.co.uk/ And the "buzz" people get from being at a rock concert? Have a look at the pictures. I do wonder what the message being proclaimed is and I am very, very cautious about any form of worship that seeks to put the assembly, so to speak, "on a high". Worship is not about manipulating people.

[docmattc]

One thing many of the evangelical churches offer is a certainty very attractive to young people in a world where 'anything goes' is the predominant culture- if you confess Jesus Christ as your Lord you WILL be saved. If you live your life according to (often quite fundamental) biblical values, you WILL be saved.
In Catholicism we have difficulty in such black and white (and fundamental) statements.
Perhaps there is a critical mass issue too- a certain number of young people encourages more young people to come along. By contrast we don't often have a core group of, say, 16-25 year olds who would form a ready made social group and attract others of their age.

I agree there is huge potential for manipulation in this setting and am very cautious about such churches. Much success may be due to the 'euphoric' style of worship (they might say Spirit-filled, we might say manipulated). Compare the vibrancy with your average Catholic Parish however, and in a shop around culture we are simply failing to compete.
Their message (and whether we agree with its content is not relevant here) is put across in a superbly polished, modern manner using up-to-the minute media which a generation who have grown up with the internet, satellite TV, ipods etc relate to superbly. By contrast our message usually uses a medium last revolutionised by William Caxton via a PA system bought secondhand from British Rail.
When we do venture into modern media, we're often not very good at it. Compare Hillsong's website with your parish's (or even diocese's) website. I'll buy you a drink at summer school if your's is more attractively laid out! (If you don't even have a parish website you can buy me one!)

The question we should be asking is not "What are we unhappy about in Hillsong-like churches?" because we could spend a lot of time doing this and criticism of something different (and threatening) is easy, but "What can we learn from their success and apply it in a Catholic setting?" We cannot deny that they are successful and are clearly engaging young people in a way that we (equally clearly) aren't

As Presybyter said when he started the thread, what we have is so much more. How do we get it over?

[presbyter]

If you live your life according to (often quite fundamental) biblical values, you WILL be saved.

More than a shade of Pelagianism in that, I think. Way too much emphasis that in effect, we save ourselves - which we don't. (refrains from continuing about the state of our human nature and the action of grace..... )

I wonder if the Scriptures are actually proclaimed in these gatherings or if the spoken content is all preaching, with a dipping in to the Bible here there and everywhere for proof texts to back up the preacher's message.

I also wonder what their notion of the Eucharist might be........ perhaps they encourage the primitive practice of meeting in their homes later for the "breaking of bread"?

[Merseysider]

We cannot deny that they are successful and are clearly engaging young people

Dictators the world over have done this for centuries.
The evangelical approach to young people scares me. I've seen too many youngsters damaged by black and white messages.

[docmattc]

The evangelical approach to young people scares me. I've seen too many youngsters damaged by black and white messages.

Scares me too. I hope no one has read my comments as defending this approach, or advocating Pelagianism. There are a good few evangelical churches on the prowl around the campus here and the university has had to take steps to curb their more muscular proselytism. ("There are no Catholic Churches in Sheffield" and "Catholics aren't real Christians, you need to come to us" are not uncommon phrases in freshers' week)

Its a fact of life though that they're there, and successful. The point I keep stressing is that sitting here criticising the evangelical approach (however justifiably) won't persuade anyone to walk into our churches rather than evangelical ones. We need to ask "What would?"

[MaryR]

Why are youth flocking to it if it is so bad?

Because it meets them where they are at.

Exactly! Whether you approve or disapprove of the Hillsong approach (and I'm not a fan by any means) the point is that it obviously appeals to young people. We need to find a way to meet young people where they're at. Currently, the trend is that youngsters start to drift away from church in their teens because that's the age they begin to rebel and parents don't have the energy for another fight. Anyway, what's the point of frogmarching them to church? They key is to engage them when they're there so they actually want to stay around. The longer they stay, the more nourished they'll be and they'll live and grow in the faith.

But if we don't get the first bit right, if we don't engage them in the first place, we'll lose them before they discover that we really do have so much more to offer.

I'm not sure how we do it but maybe I'll have some ideas after this weekend! The SSG Youth Focus Working Party meets for the first time tomorrow. We'll be looking at how we can encourage young people to learn more about liturgy and church music, and how we can facilitate that learning. Any suggestions will be gratefully received.

[presbyter]

Currently, the trend is that youngsters start to drift away from church in their teens

But please distinguish :

1. Those who are drifting away and engaging in no active public worship in another ecclesial community - or even (these days) in another faith. Church of any sort is a waste of time.

2. Those who are drifting away and are instead engaging in worship in another ecclesial community - because it is lively.

3. Those young adults who have never had any contact with Christian worship, or even the Gospel.

Is this theatrical phenomenon attracting mainly those of group 2 who are bored with their local churches (of any denomination)? Or is it "making Christians", as it were, from scratch - Group 3 ? I wonder what the percentages are of groups 2 and 3 in this theatre.

[Alan]

Any suggestions will be gratefully received.

Not least because school music, in and out of the classroom, has improved so much in recent years (OK - not everywhere), very many young people are good musicians - singers, instrumentalists, composers - even if most of them don't deploy their musical talents in church (assuming they even attend). Thanks to the requirements of the National Curriculum and, above all, to the hard work of music teachers, the idea that young people might write their own songs is by no means alien to them. They have also been encouraged to be critical listeners, not mere uncritical consumers.

So... how about doing more to encourage young people to compose songs and music for the liturgy? Get in workshop leaders with the appropriate skills and experience to 'lead out' (educare) the young people's ideas. Not just musical skills, of course; in a sense the music is only the medium that carries the message. If they have got hold of the wrong message (such as 'I have to earn salvation, and I can' or 'it just between me and Jesus') then let's address that too. Many of us parents can testify to having seen our own teenagers finding fellowship and committment in their local non-Catholic churches, having failed to find it in the Catholic parish. More than at any other age, teenagers are 'group animals'. We need to recognise that and accommodate to it. Pastoral skills too: let's encourage them to create songs and music that will be welcomed and used (and useable) in the parish - not in the safe ghetto of some 'Youth Mass' but at the main Sunday celebration. Hey! I think I just encompassed the musical/liturgical/pastoral thing.

Young people are well capable of creating good music which is 'fit for purpose'. We need to give them encouragement and opportunities. On-going opportunities that is, not merely 'there was a youth music workshop yesterday, and here's a little song they came up with'. If that scares you, consider this: many parish music leaders, with less musical knowledge, skills or understanding than a good GCSE Music student, think nothing of foisting their latest psalm or motet on their uncomplaining congregations. The paucity of invention and sheer mediocrity of so much of that scares me - and it has scared the young people away too.

All teachers know that, given the requisite skills, knowledge and encouragement, young people can surprise and delight us (and themselves) with what they are capable of. In the Good Old Days (ROFL) young people did as they were told and came to church (they still doing so, aged 60+). These days, young people, thank God, think for themselves. They will probably not choose to have anything to do with a Church or a church that deigns to 'welcome' them on its own terms while, at the same time, appearing to hold them, their skills, and their enthusiasms, at little value. Where will they be at 60? Not in church - and they, and we, and our music, will be the poorer for it.