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Research Cont...

Youth Ministry Culture Research

As we interacted with teens related to the reasons they leave the youth group as juniors and seniors we found hypocrisy to be at the top of their list. As it turned out when they brought up hypocrisy, they were not talking about hypocrisy among adults in the church but rather the hypocrisy among the students in their youth group. As we worked with them to define what was going on it became clear that was a significant problem. The teens defined the hypocrisy occurring within the youth group as "leading an intentionally deceptive dual life", meaning knowing what to say to keep peace at home and how to act in church but leading a very different life when away from these audiences. Further, we found that in many youth groups the students were working together to get around the "rules" and to cover up their sin. As we talked about this with groups around the country we have asked what percentage of the students in their youth group were leading this dual life. The response we received from students was typically that between 50% and 85% of the teens in their youth group were leading a deceptive dual life. In fact, we have students on camera sharing the reason they left the church was that every time they returned to the youth group they got sucked back into that subculture and into activities that made them feel guilty.

YTN is piloting community youth initiatives to combat this and other issues we found within the culture. Asking incoming freshmen to stand tall in a youth group that's culture has gone wrong is a monumental order. We have chosen a community based approach for addressing our research and tests with youth ministries for two reasons:

It is vital that senior pastors, youth pastors and parents align on the direction each ministry will take to address these issues. Disunity will prevent real change from occurring. When these groups are not aligned it is like a tire that is out of balance. There is increased friction and wear leading to a blow out. Something that happens far to often in relation to youth ministry.
The issues are deep and require time to process and talk. The community youth initiative creates forums for pastors and parents to begin to understand, process and ponder what needs to change in their environment. Read more about community youth initiative.
YTN desires to work through the authority channels of the local church allowing first senior pastors to consider the issues in relationship to their church, than leading to the youth pastors and finally their parents.

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