youth

Derrick Flannigan, a good friend and relatively new blogger, has posted a link to a trailer for Segregation, a movie discussing youth ministry in Protestant Churches in the U.S. The gist of the movie is that by segregating youth from other parts of the church, individual churches are unable to retain young people after they enter college.

This is a trend that I have seen happen in many a young person's life... and these days, without proper catechesis of the youth (many don't even know basic tenets of the faith—Protestant or Catholic), many leave the Church and never look back. Even after they become older/wiser.

From Derrick's post:

According to the NCFIC, "65% and 85% of Christian youth leave the church when they enter college" (www.ncfic.org). Such numbers are shocking, to say the least! I would only hope that the Catholic Church could boast of having fewer numbers.

This weekend and next I'll be live-blogging for the Office of Youth Ministry at Missouri State University, for the Steubenville St. Louis Mid-America youth conference. Check out the Live Blog here, and see photos from the first week of Steubenville on Flickr (I'll be updating all of these things as time goes on!).

(Above photo: Nikon D90 w/ 12-24mm f/4 lens).