In Defense of Millennials

They are "digital natives," sending thousands of text messages each month. They don't value marriage highly. They are postponing the responsibilities of adulthood. They are narcissistic.

Who are "they"? If you were in worship with me yesterday, you would know the answer is "Millennials" or members of "Generation Y" -- the rising generation of men and women from the ages of 12-32.

Yesterday, the church I have been visiting took a break from our recent study of Colossians for a special presentation on the need to reach Millennials with the Gospel.

I have done little more than skim the abundant research on Generation Y (this article from The Atlantic provides a nice survey), but, being the narcissistic Millennial that I am, I am always interested to see how the established generations perceive those of us who are just reaching the threshold of our thirties.

The presentation was rather doom-and-gloom, featuring the typical sound bytes about my generation's dissociation from institutional religion, our ridiculously inflated sense of self-esteem, and our skepticism about marriage.

I'm not denying that those are some of the excesses and faults of my generation. I can only speak anecdotally, but I have railed against many of these traits in my own students, who are (at the youngest) still within ten years of my own age. For example, when they say in the same breath, "Yes, there are absolute truths," and "Opinions can't be wrong,"  I am tempted to bemoan the future of a world entrusted to such cheerful and unthinking relativists.

Nevertheless, yesterday's presentation dismayed me because it only presented aspects of my generation that seem to pose a threat to the spread of the Gospel.  After church I spoke at length about this topic with my mother, who has spent the past thirty years laboring to proclaim the Gospel and to build God's Kingdom among college students. She pointed out that while many Millennials are uninvolved in church, they are also more open to the idea of a spiritual life than many of the hard-line materialists of the previous generations. Similarly, while it is true that many young adults are moving home or moving from job to job, it is also true that we, unlike our parents, do not define our success primarily by our monetary wealth.

This conversation with my mother emphasized a point that yesterday's speaker only mentioned at the end of his talk, namely, that if churches want to reach Millennials, they cannot do it by demanding that Millennials learn the "cultural norms" of church-going Gen Xers, Baby Boomers, and elders. Instead, he said, we must offer them the norms of the Gospel.

There is so much hope and power in that statement. Instead of creating a false sense of urgency about Millennials "postponing adult responsibilities," I wish he would have focused his presentation on the differences between the norms of, for example, the Baby Boomers, and the norms of the Gospel.

We want a better vision of adulthood than the mirage that lures so many men and women into lonely marriages, fruitless careers, and destructive communities. To ease my discontent with this Sunday's presentation, I tried to imagine what it such a sermon would have sounded like at Calvary, my church home in Texas. Imagination soon turned to memory: in January of this year I heard another sermon about young adults, but one with so much more precision and hope. If you'd like to listen, visit this link and listen to Jonathan Tran's sermon from 1/22/12. To hear the sermon, jump to minute 37:50).

Please don't misunderstand me: my generation needs the Gospel just as urgently as every generation since Adam and Eve stumbled out of Eden. We need good news and discipleship and communion. However, before you rail against us, make sure that it is the Gospel you are living, and not simply the norms of your own generation.

What are the differences between inviting people into "the norms of our [older] generations" and "the norms of the Gospel"? How can churches reach Generation Y?

Introduction: Letters from Home?

Last Friday, as I sat at a “S’mores and Sex” Sunday School party, I realized something was terribly wrong. The party was not the problem: despite the provocative name, I was enjoying the tame but happy gathering of other graduate students and young professionals.  Our Sunday School class has recently welcomed a new couple as our teachers, and they had suggested our class should have social events in addition to our regular Sunday-morning Bible studies. So far, so good. After mingling over s’mores, cider, and snickerdoodles, one of our teachers introduced the night’s discussion topic, “Singleness,  Marriage, Sex, and Everything In Between.”  He asked a number of questions about what it means to be a young adult--especially an unmarried young adult--in today’s churches.  As I listened to my peers’ answers--which ranged from dating to family, hermeneutics to vocation, and beyond--I realized that my own concerns about how churches treat young adults were not merely idiosyncratic worries. The lawyer sitting next to me, the sociologist across the room, the seminary student--they also had realized something was amiss. 

Even if I wanted to, I could not transcribe Friday’s long conversation. However, the refrain of our questions and stories was this: very few of our churches had taken an active interest in the spiritual formation of young adults, especially if they are unmarried.  

Ours was not a bitter conversation, nor a session of complaints.  We all lead meaningful, satisfying lives. Some there are involved in serious relationships, others who attend our class but were missing Friday are married.  However, I heard many substantive, moving questions about how our churches train young adults to be part of the Body of Christ. I came home thinking about many of my own (usually-unvoiced) concerns about what it means to live the life I am living: the life of a teacher, a scholar, a daughter, a deacon, a friend, an unmarried twenty-something.  Questions about what it means for you to live the lives you are leading. Hopes about how these lives are meant to come together. 

On Saturday, I decided to start this blog. Admittedly, I am a little late to the blogging bandwagon, but my mother taught me to keep quiet until I have something to say.  

I have a few things to say. I think you probably do, too. Somewhat to my surprise, I think I intend to write a blog about relationships, and about how life in Christ upsets many assumptions about our  friendships, marriages, parenthoods, and more. For years I have been pondering the idea of “home,” and I want to use this electronic chronicle as a place to work out questions about what it means to be at home--with one another, with ourselves, and within our churches.  

 Many of the things I have to say come from my experiences and observations as a single person in a church culture that tends to worship the nuclear family, but I am not writing this blog only for single people, or for young people, or for women.  Many of the things I have to say have been gleaned from my generous, and wise married friends.  Indeed, much of what I hope to do here is pose questions that you, my friends, can answer, extend, and complicate.

I thought about several titles for this blog, including

“The Single Person’s Guide to Abundant Living” (too narrow in its audience, and it sounds like something from the self-help aisle at Barnes & Noble)

“The Married Person’s Guide to Keeping Single Friends” (again, too narrow, possibly snarky, and it sounds like a pet-owner’s manual)

“Radical Hospitality” (better, but “radical” is becoming dangerously trendy)

I have settled on “Letters from Home” because it best captures the sense of both sadness and hope I feel when I look around my church, my city, my country, and this world, hoping to glimpse the Kingdom of God.  We have been promised a home, but we are not there yet.  A letter signals both presence and absence: I can cherish the envelope in my hand, knowing that the sender also held it, but  holding an envelope is not as sweet as holding someone’s hand. Letters are sent when distance interferes with complete communion. Letters provide our records of the early churches.  I’m attempting a to send and receive a few letters from this promised, obscured, real, imagined, holy, humble home. I want to gather ideas, questions, and meditations on how we can create home for one another.  Like my other ideas, this title has its dangers. To some, it probably seems sentimental.  So be it. I don’t mind thinking of this blog as a kind of cross-stitched sampler I am hanging on the internet’s cluttered wall, and if “home” has become a sentimental word, I would rather fight sentimentality with honesty and laughter than with cynicism. 

With all these hopes and questions in mind, I intend to post entries in the following categories: 

Abundant Lives: Profiles of people whose lives overflow with grace, love, humor, strength, and courage

Making it Home: Ideas about what it means to practice hospitality, ranging from the lofty (Sabbath-keeping) to the mundane (bread recipes)

Life Undivided:  Questions, thanksgiving, complaints, and meditations on what it means to walk alongside each other as fellow pilgrims

To review: I hope to use this blog as a forum for questions and thoughts about how life in Christ affects the way we live as friends, children, spouses, parents, siblings.  Because of own stage of life, many of my posts will relate to my experiences as a young adult and an unmarried person, but I am interested in hearing from all my readers, even (especially!) if you are in a different season of your life.   

Coming up next time…..”Making it Home”: How a Crockpot May Have Saved My Life

You have patiently listened to me thus far, and now I want to hear from you:   1) What does the word “home” mean to you? 2) Does your current church provide a sense of home for you? If so, how? If not, what could your church do differently?