Techno backlash: Cool kids are leading a technology revolt and unplugging gadgets in order to reconnect with one another, says major British newspaper The Independent. This has been predicted for sometime.¹ But the thing that is important for youth ministry, the thing I want to highlight, is something that The Independent article glosses. What’s happening here is NOT a backlash against the disconnection produced by things that plugin; this is a backlash against the disconnection that our society fosters whether plugged in or unplugged. The 20th century was largely about assuming that technology is the answer to societal woes. It’s not, but neither is disconnecting from technology. The technology isn’t the issue.

The church gets caught up in this frenzy as well: Should we include or exclude technology from ministry and worship? Even Emergent churches get caught in this trap. Unfortunately, inclusion and exclusion discussions aren’t the heart of the matter because they’re responses to the wrong issue. The real issue is a matter of disconnection from self, others and the divine. The real issue is much deeper than technology; it’s one that the church in its true missional fullness is called to respond to by offering communion with God and others — something which technology or the exclusion of technology can’t fix. Unfortunately, we’re often too busy arguing about Powerpoint backgrounds and whether there should be a projection screen in the sanctuary to take notice of the deeper longing of the human soul that the church has been divinely equipped to respond to.

Sunday School for Atheists: Just when Christians were all but ready to give up on Sunday school (actually I gave up long ago), atheists are jumping on the bandwagon offering children lessons in humanist thought and apologetics. Read the Time magazine article.

Emerging Adulthood: Books and Culture has an interesting essay by sociologist Chris Smith on Jeffrey Arnett’s proposal of a developmental phase between adolescence and full adulthood called emerging adulthood. The concept is a few years old, but it really appears to be taking off. Emerging adulthood appears to be the new de facto way of referring to 18 to 25 year olds in recent articles I’ve read in the Journal of Adolescence and elsewhere.

1. The last time I heard a prediction like this was by Zach Suchin, CEO of College Tonight during The Millenials conference in NYC. Also, keep in mind that this involves a minor subset of youth and is a trend that’s not likely to go mainstream. One of the things I know well from my days in journalism is that the status quo doesn’t sell newspapers, so as journalists we have to cover the new and novel regardless of how minor the movement may be. [↩]

At the behest of the Pennsylvania State Pastor’s Convention I’ve been toying recently with the question, “How does online social networking affect adolescent understandings of belonging and membership?” I think it’s an interesting question, one that I ultimately broadened to include issues of both belonging and identity as they relate to a variety of technologies, not just social networking like MySpace and Facebook. Text messaging, blogging, MMORPG’s, and virtual worlds all contribute to how youth understand community and personal identity. These were the issues I tackled during a plenary session at the convention in Harrisburg earlier this month. I don’t have a recording of the PA event, but you can see my first stab at the issues in a lecture (video) I gave November 1 at Princeton Seminary. It’s rough, but gives a good glimpse at some of the thoughts I’ve been exploring lately. Luckily, I was able to refine the lecture for the pastor’s convention, and I figure that after I present this material another 8 to 10 times I might actually like what I have to say.

I lectured recently on neuroscience and youth ministry for Kenda Creasy Dean’s Advanced Studies in Youth, Church and Culture. Yes, teenagers and brains. Everybody seems to have a joke about the teenage brain, or the lack thereof. In more than a decade of youth ministry I’ve heard my fair share of snide comments from pastors and laity alike about the mental ineptitude of the youth I work with. You mean they have a brain? The teenagers in my house are brain dead. And the comments keep coming.

Of course, contrary to popular conception, neuroscientists are finding that the teenage brain is a place of incredible activity. There are roughly 100 billion neurons firing away within the human brain, and teenage brains are no exception. In fact, teenagers appear to have more neurons than they will by the time they turn 25. But one difference (among many) between teen and adult brains is that there is an incredible plasticity to the teenage brain. It’s being shaped and moulded in amazing ways. The 100 billion neurons of the teenage brain are still in the process of forming synaptic connections to other neurons. Key areas of the teenage brain have not yet become all that they will be. In light of plasticity and the 100 billion neurons of the teenage brain, it was with interest that I stumbled upon this: (more…)