September 2006 Archives

Yesterday I had a meeting in central Oxford so I unfolded my trusty folding bike and zipped into the City. So in a bizzare confluence of stuff, I am then meeting a Youth worker in the Krispy Kreme Doughnut Cafe which is in the grounds of the castle outside of which a TV crew are filming some stuff for Lewis (the spin off from the Morse TV series). I thought this mix of the medieval, the modern, American fast food and the British Media all in the same place was quite fun!

I note that the camera was positioned so that you'd never know that Colin Dexter (pictured) was standing right by the doughnut shop, I took the photo from the entrance! I do however like to think that if you listen carefully when this programme is finally aired that you'll hear the click, click, clunk of my bike being folded/unfolded in the background :-)

Also, if you are in Oxford go and try Krispy Kreme! They were very supportive of a youth event we ran so I'm giving them a plug by way of thanks!

I'm leading a session on Predestination and Free Will tomorrow so I rather liked this offering from the Sacred Sandwich.

The Spirituality of Generation Y day at LICC was great. The unpacking of the research has come quite a way since the preliminary findings were presented at the CTE day last year and we got into more reflection on implications today! The intervening 18 months have also seen a better understanding of the way that Phil Rankin's research and that of Sylvie and Bob Mayo's, complement each other.

The two different types of spirituality that Bob flagged up last April (2005) were still the main foundations that the exploration was built on, those of

1.Formative Spirituality (a private, often unarticulated approach to life, prayer etc)
2. Transformative Spirituality (A spirituality that affects public areas of life)

Today the concept of a "Happy Midi-narrative" was a key theme. That Young People look for and believe in the possibility of happiness, that this is their prevelant worldview. This may possibly bury the formative spirituality beneath this world view and leave it unexamined. What was clear however is that there was very little evidence that young people thought they had a need for a transformative spirituality and therefore, that the "God shaped hole" that needed filling was a myth (at least in the experience and quest of young people), Bob referred to this gap between these two spiritualities as a 'black hole' to emphasise the vast gulf. The "Happy midi-narrative" posed some interesting speculations as to what happens when a young person fails to achieve happiness? Is the gap between the worldview and what a young person is experiencing when hurting a cause of self harm etc?

Phil Rankin was usefully able to show how willing young people are to talk about their spirituality providing it's on their space and that us REALLY listening is the goal. Bob was also very interested in both the right space and place to move toards the transformative, but further than this believed that the 'when' and the 'with whom' were vital pieces and it was at the place where these met the 'where' that the move towards transformative might happen.

The over-riding question of the day though (that was both examined and left with us) was

How do we enable a bridge to be made between Formative Spirituality towards that of Transformative Spirituality?

I'll write more as I get the day clearer in my head! Great to see so many youth minister friends there.

Other reports and reflections:

Deep Thought
Ben Bell
Tim Abbott

And finally: Mark Berry was asking related questions to passers by in Telford today.

Source = Shawn (thanks)

I love this postcard! I can't remember the exact context but it came from a web site that encouraged people to send in cards that expressed their confessions, thoughts or hopes. This one is kind of sad but beautiful and hopeful at the same time I think.

I got me thinking about teenagers we work with and I wondered what their postcards might be? (in fact next time I work with a group I'm SO going to do something similar!)

Reflecting on teenagers I've worked with though and my own experiences I wondered what they might 'ask' about who we are as youth ministers?

? Will you be THE PerSon WHO wants tO KNOW and like who I REALLY AM and be the Adult Friend who takes ME SERIOUSLY ?

I am pleased to announce the winner of the BEST Tuck Bar in the Diocese awards, henceforth known as the TiBDA awards. I know I forgot to actually tell anyone they existed but nevertheless the 2006 award goes to
*Drum Roll*

The CORE Youth Club at St Peters and St Leonards Church in Iver *Cheering, Applause*

There is a serious point to this as so much GREAT relational stuff can happen if there's a place a youth group to sit and chat over food (or Tuck) and so I'm now taking nominations for the 2007 TiBDA aards which will include a new catergory of "Best non permenant (or improvised) Tuck Bar"

I also hope we can have a serious discussion on non junk alternatives that various groups have discovered to sell. At the moment a lot of the merchandise is an 'e' filled sugar fest at most youth groups. Simon articulates the struggle well, here AND Sarah suggests a definitive answer here although I'd probably disagree ;-)

Can of Coke and three packets of smarties, anyone ..........

Wandering into my local Starbucks (as I do) I as surprised to discover that 'Geography is a flavour!'

This led to some latte induced musing. In a similar vein ......

Chemistry is a smell
Physics is a headache
English Literature is an (acquired) taste

I also seem to recall that Geography wasn't in fact a flavour BUT more, a LOT of colouring in.

My Dell laptop thankfully was not amongst those that spectacularly combust and were recalled. Regular reader(s) will know though that it has a curious affliction whereby keys drop off and go AWOL, first the 'Z' and then the 'W' have vanished in this manner.

Having being a Church based worker I am adept at improvising and also furnishing DIY repairs (Gaffa tape is a staple requirement for Youth ministers I reckon) and so I have had a bash at fixing the Laptop. Using the weird key below the escape button for which I know of no purpose and the "Alt Gr" key (again, no idea) as donors I have then grafted them into the correct position and then applied Tippex to re-mark them.

You probably can't tell at all as it's such a good job but for the more observant and technically adept, here's the results of the invisible repair ;-)

Under the Terrorism Act 2006 Section 3

“any act that glorifies the commission or preparation (whether in the past, in the future or generally) of such acts or offences” is illegal"
So I hope you weren't planning to celebrate Bonfire Night on November 5th !!!!!!!!

Discovered via an excellent post by Richard Peat

I think this will be an important book, I haven't read it yet BUT have just pre-ordered it, Go ye and do likewise!

Happy in My Skin. Due out on October 15th
You saw it here first folks! .... or possibly somewhere else :-)

I am helping put together an article on Youth Emmaus and Youth Alpha (plus any other nurture courses you've used with young people). I'd love to know some stories of how it worked in your setting, I also really really want some stories from young people and what they made of it.

Can you help?

Didn't want to get out of bed this morning and Didn't want to go to the office. Have decided Thursday is the New Monday! I am going to need to develop a strategy to cope with Thursdays ..... maybe setting up an emergency youthworker on-call system where I can be summoned from my desk to intervene, minister or informally educate wherever rapid deployment is needed in the Diocese. *Rrrrrrrng*

"Gotta Dash, sounds like a job for Youthworker bloke"

In the meantime I shall go back to piloting my desk, Thursday is the new Monday!

This comprehensive catalogue of pics where Branson looks like Jesus is really funny, all credit to Ship of Fools for making me laugh :-)

I quite often get calls from Churches asking the question,

"How much should we pay a Youth Minister?"

Mostly this is a genuine question but one or two churches mean, What's the minimum we could pay and still get someone? Hence, across the Churches there is a massive range of salaries/stipends.

Being a Youth Minister for a Church is a tough call. The contracts can be short, worse still, things can suddenly come to an abrupt end. A new role normally means re-locating PLUS there is no real promotion prospects PLUS Churches think all Youth Ministers should be young! For these reasons a Church really needs to be providing accomodation and a fair wage (the accomodation is essential as Youth Ministers can't usually afford to move to the employing Parish, the fair wage being, I hope, a christian approach). A lot of Churches do provide an attractive renumeration.

I would nearly always recognise a Youth ministers complaints about lack of line management, moans about short-termism and gripes about projects ending too soon, however I've been surprised recently to hear a couple of youth ministers (from well paying churches) complain about their earnings.

Now lots of youth ministers have every right/need to be concerned about lack of pay but where the package is Accomodation plus Stipend, it's worth noting that it's a fair wage if you do the maths, and here I'm playing a heavens-advocate* a bit. (*Devil's-advocate didn't seem quite the right expression)

Lets say the house provided would otherwise cost £750 a month to rent, that's £9000 a year. Add on to that £1000 Council Tax and £300 Water Rates and that's £10,300 a year. If you are required to live in the house for the "better performance of duty" and you are employed as a minister, then this £10,300 is untaxed. Not only that but you'd have to earn £13,200 (in the real world) to leave you with that £10,300 after the Tax had been taken off. On top of this, a Stipend of around £16,000 is not unusual for these type of appointments. So in order to have the equivelant house/income in a secular role you'd (adding thse two figures together) need to be earning £29,200 (more in fact because the NI contributions would be much higher).

I've no wish to be shouted at by the youth worker/ministers who earn a lot less than this and I know there are FAR TOO MANY who do, I did however want to point out that for the good roles it is a fair renumeration.
I also think this figure is entirely justified because of the ad-hoc and often short term realities of working for a church, especially as Youth Ministers have none of the perks and support that clergy have. Further to this, although the package can be good it doesn't give ANY long term options i.e No job = no house.

I asked a colleague at work today how she was on a scale from 1 to 10? In order to define the scale I added, "where 1 is the Smiths and 10 is Bon Jovi!" This idea quite amused me and led to some thought about other ways of defining bad-to-good scales.

Where 1 is Marvin the Paranoid Android and 10 is Zaphod Beeblebrox
Where 1 is Semolina and 10 is Black Forest Gateaux
Where 1 is a Tank Top and 10 is a Hoody
Where 1 is Bognor Regis and 10 is Hawaii

Anyway, I need some more ideas including some that would connect with young people!

Well it is Talk Like a Pirate Day and sadly there does not appear to be any appropriate liturgy or even a prayer in the book of common worship!

Can someone please draft a suitable prayer that I can a) use and b) pass onto ITLAP HQ!
(Go on, you know you want to)

What can you do for me? What can I do for you?

I am looking for an administrator! Valerie is retiring from the position and we have failed to appoint someone. If you know a good adminisrator who'd enjoy working in a fun and lively office doing an Admin support job for 3.5 people ... and is good at prioritising, then please point them this way. In selling them the job you can decide for yourself whether he fact they'd be working wih me is a 'pro' or a 'con' (Applicaion pack available)

And in the "What I can do for you" corner, I potentially have a 2 day a week student on offer if your project would be interested!

If you are interesed in either of the above please send an e-mail entiled either, "Gisa job!" or " Gisa Student!"

Diocesan Ones:

Quench are playing Newbury on September the 29th, the tickets are dirt cheap and it'll be a great gig. Phone 07790 907768 to find out more. There is a new YOUTH SERVICE starting at Wheatly, first one is on Oct 9th. The next NETWORK day for full-timers is at Eton Dorney on October 11th, e-mail me to get the low down. VERTIGO 4 is on October 14th.

National Ones:

Sept 27th Spirituality of Generation Y day in London (looking forward to catching up with some youthwork sisterin and bretherin there), more details from LICC.
Oct 10/11th, a 24 hour retreat at Chellington in Bedfordshire, e-mail Julie
Oct 10/11th, More Than Survival Conference for Female Youth Workers. E-mail for details.
Oct 15-21st. Excellent 1 week FOUNDATIONS course in youth/community work, run by Fusion.
Nov 10/12 and 17/19th Youthwork the Conference Southport 10-12 Nov, Eastbourne 17-19 Nov.

2007

Soulnet weekend conference run by Soul Survivor at Centre Parcs, March 2-4th
The Matrix, March 5-7th at High Leigh conference centre.

I really love the stuff that FYT are doing around the theme of Young people as Prophets and am excited about what young people hear, discern and will have to say. Do get your young people involved in this project and ESPECIALLY the chance to have a say in the meeting that Dave Wiles and Roger Sainsbury have with a Treasury minister next month.

ht to Richard for reminding me to flag this up

I love weekends! My daughter and I are sitting in the lounge chilling and listening to her CD's. She's really into a wide range of music and we're mellowing out to some truly eclectic stuff, currently some great African music. Before that we were listening to '99 Luftballons' by Nena and I was trying to explain the Cold War to her in order to make sense of the song. (The cold war seems to make even less sense when you try and explain it). I did lead to the discovery of this FANTASTIC 80's site though which has a great biog of each band and an awesome lyrics listing. Oh we're onto Sandi Thom now and both wishing we were Punkrockers .. or at least singing to that effect.

I can't remember why I started writing this entry? I think I meant to write about the Tweenagers training I was delivering this morning and posting this link if you were there and wanted more info!
I have a meeting with Ruth Hassall of CPAS on Monday to discuss Tweenagers as we are co-writing a GROVE booklet on Tweens. Do I then get to claim to be an author or am I merely a co-author?

Tomorrow is a family get together as my parents have been married for 50 years! I'd post my congratulations here but my folks never read my blog ..... I bet however that mum buys about 70 copies or the Tweenagers book even if I'm only the co-author :-)

An important reminder that September 19th is imminent, this is one of the most important commemerative celebration days on the international calender! It would therefore be wise to spend the weekend readying yourself and the youth group for the annual "Talk Like a Pirate Day"

The official web page is here, the UK version here and some background via Wikipedia here! If you are looking for some help with the linguistic nuances of Piratical patter then here is a useful intro!

Given how many serious but improbable days, weeks of __________ (insert anything) awareness there actually are, that do in fact end up sounding rather silly, I'm delighted to embrace a day that is deliberately and intentionally silly ..... NOW that is something I can take seriously, arrrrr!

If anyone has got any swashbuckling malarkey plans for Tuesday then do tell. Bring on the silliness .....

Don't say I didn't be tellin' you!

If you've been a youth leader/worker for a while then you'll have taken groups to ALL the usual activities: Canoeing, Climbing, Theme Park, Bowling et etc etc ad-infinitum. The pursuit for something really different and truly memorable is a difficult one and especially one that actually welcomes AND likes young people.
Reading through YPN today I came across the definitive answer!!!! Indoor Skydiving, how cool is this?

So if you are in mininbus range of Milton Keynes and can secure some funding, GO FOR IT! (There's also a centre in Bedfordshire) Oh and if you would like the Diocesan Youth Adviser to accompany you, I reckon I can make time ;-)

Sept 18th is B day! Seat belt regulations are changing in the UK as I expect most people realise BUT just in case here's the Youthblog low-down, my take on where we stand on car seats (as it were).

The full changes are here but the bit that may effect youthworkers is that any child who is a a passenger in the car BUT is not yet 12 AND under 135 cm's needs to be sitting on a booster seat in addition to having a correctly fitted seatbelt. In actual fact though, most 11 year olds are this height already ... but if you are working with much younger young-people you may need to invest in a few booster seats (which don't need to have backs, despite the photo's being used in various adverts), these are relatively inexpensive and a worthwhile investment.

Oh and if you have a Youth group mascot, you'll be needing one of these in addition* ........

*not because of the legislation you understand, merely so pooch can see out of the window!

"Let the world retain in memory
that mighty tongues tell mighty lies
and if mankind must have an enemy
let it be his warlike pride"
Bruce Cockburn

Am very struck by this piece of reflection from Steve Lawson and this from Mark Berry.

I nipped into Oxford this morning, pedalling into the city of spires as a sanity break from the Office! These sanity breaks are REALLY important as I am not designed to cope with being still for long periods of time. It is however unclear as to whose sanity benefits the most from a break, mine or the rest of the Office.
Anyway despite the usual gladitorial battle with the traffic (which I always win) I had no particular plans other than coffee! Cycling past the station I was riding through the lights* at the same time as Dave Wiles was crossing. Dave Wiles, youth work legend, FYT boss and all round top bod! So we went for a coffee and had a great chat about youth ministry and the like. I love spontaneous meetings!

And the other great spontaneous discovery today was that Youthblog features in a links list on a Wikipedia article, which I am very chuffed about :-)

*For the record the traffic light was green and I was not crashing the lights, Dave was late crossing

I can't help feeling that this product is too niche to be viable.

However if you are a Christian with a penchant for the tacky AND a dog lover with no taste (as well as owning a dog with no self respect) AND a fan of non standard computer operating systems then, boy do this company have a product for you! Oh and If you feel the need for you and your dog to create a complementing look then you too have options, lots of them.

ENJOY :-)

ht to Rhys (whose blog URL I seeem to have lost, sorry!)

Vertigo. October 14th. Be there! or err, miss it!
I need a Cafe team if anyone is up for it AND I need a new strap line for the Cafe Team T shirts

The weekend is over and I have that "Oh no, it's school tomorrow!" feeling. But it's been a cracking weekend, I started reading this book by Shane Claiborne .... fab book which is exciting and challenging me in equal parts. Review to follow when i have finished reading it (I would have read more but my lovely wife was so taken with the book that she swiped it and completed it first).

I spent some great time with the family and we finally got our tent back into the bag after bringing it home wet from a camping weekend A MONTH AGO!

I cycled quite a long way and also spent time wondering where in the picture the frisbee is? I have seen said frisbee and firmly believe it should stay out of the shot ;-)

Oh and I've been invited to do two talks, one on 'Sex' and one on 'Predestination'! I wonder if (to save making two journies) I could combine the two talks? Suggestions for a title please!

Thought I'd share an important accounting technique that is very useful when you are running events or residentials!
As you know, you can't make an omelete without cracking eggs (well you could I guess but it'd be very crunchy in parts and too soggy in others) and in the same way you can't run a youth event without spending money! Now in an ideal world, outgoings would equal income, but often it doesn't and PARTICULARLY in youth work.

Yellow Braces (Diocesan Youth Camp) being an example (accounts have just arrived on my desk here) where the difference is £300 in the wrong direction. But this is where my useful accounting technique comes in. Yellow Braces did not make a loss, absolutely not ..... it turned in a negative profit! (How much better does that sound!)

I thought I'd mention it here just in case anyone else managed to make large negative profits in the summer programme!

Matrix the Conference. Be there! (oh and come to my seminar PLLLLEEEAASSSSSE).
It is the best Christian Youthwork conference in the Universe (probably) and my favourite.

Matrix: Freedom to Flourish March 5-7th 2007

For the booking form and info Download file Click, print, fill-in and post, see you there!

Thanks Moog

I finally got around to taking the offspring to see Cars at the cinema (better late than never) and Wow is it ever a stunning piece of animation. The charcterisation, the imaginative detail and especially the jaw dropping quality of the animation are all extrodinary. I am even prepared to over-look the fact that plot wise it was a re-hash of Doc Hollywood. Although lacking in the originality stakes, the dialogue and humour were well up to Pixar standards, great fun! Bonus points too for coming up with a new gimmic for the post credits malarkey, don't leave the cinema 'til you've seen this :-)

As wow as the film was though it still left me slightly uncomfortable. The celebration of automotive freedom, the promotion of driving for pleasure and the view that traffic could be a towns' redemption felt so at odds with enviromental realities and the societal damage the car does, that it just felt kinda wrong. But, a great piece of film!

Useful Clips: Not that many spring to mind as it was a bit formulaic in it's story but I may end up using the Doc Hudson interaction with Lightning, at the dirt track, for training on Mentoring.

P.S Decided to go a bit cryptic with the picture, general feeling of well-being obtained by working out the connection

I see Licensing for Youth Workers is still on the agenda so there's still chance to join my campaign that the license has to be a metal badge in a leather folder (ala the NYPD)

Youthworker, "Stand back folks, I'll handle this (flashes badge)
Crowd, "Phew it's OK, the youth worker is here!"

You may have spotted that the Faithful Cities report recommended that youthworkers are given Key Worker status!
I want it to go further though, we want flashing blue lights for our cars/bicycles!

This is rather a cool web site (although I have ENORMOUS sympathy for whoever inputted all the data), it's called Surname Profiler and it will show you which counties have the greatest concentration of your surname for 1881 and 1998. You can then get an idea of which county your forebears mostly partied in and where they are now.
Great fun! As I failed to record Dot in my "I spy" update I'll use Gosling as the example. So here's where the 1881 Goslings hung out! The purple is the most prevelant, so East Anglia was home but there's already a good number up North waiting for Chester University to be built.

Thought you could run a funky youthwork session around this looking at where young people's family came from and some of the habits/characterisics they've inheritted from the Family. Then going onto explore where people have had experiences or moments that have shaped their faith characteristics and influenced what they believe and what difference that makes.

I'm supposed to be writing an article about Greenbelt for the Diocesan Newspaper but it's proving quite difficult, partially because I have a black belt in procrastination and partly because I keep finding infinitely better reviews online than I can create. This quote being a case in point from Steve lawson:

”Greenbelt was entirely integral and vital to my developing into a human being, helping me deal with increasing levels of discomfort at what was happening in the various churches I attended, and also providing me with the link between social and political activism and faith. Greenbelt has always been about the intersection of the arts, spirituality and social activism - using the arts to reflect on what our spirituality compels us to do”

A while back the "z" key dropped off my laptop, the "w" has now joined it. This is also making writing more tricky. (I e-mailed IT and asked for advice when the "z" left and they sent me an e-mail full of Z's and suggested I cut and paste! Which made me laugh)

The missing letter challenge and procrastination gives me chance to update my I SPY book of bloggers from Greenbelt. I spotted (left to right) Andrew Jones (alias Tall Skinny Kiwi) at the Nizlopi gig, Dave (42) Warnock at the Wib gathering, Dave (Cartoon Church) signing his book at the CT Yurt and Phil (Headway Youth) at a gig in the Traidcraft tent. Loads of points eh!

Oh and the piccy of Dave reminds me that if you don't understand the Church of England you should buy Dave's book. It won't help your understanding at all but you'll get to chortle out-loud at the way Dave sees it.

I've been asked a 'few' times about how to recruit volunteers so I thought I'd throw some stuff together from my experience to see if it was of any use. The cunning bit then is that hopefully more wisdomy types will add some thoughts via the comments and we'll arrive at something useful.

1. ASK! Vague desperate pleas read out by the vicar DO NOT WORK. "We need someone, anybody PLEASE?" is not a great pitch and beside which it gives a potential volunteer the idea that they are just being thrown at a problem rather than recruited to a ministry! Pray, think, reflect and ask specific people.

2. PRESENT VISION! People don't respond to vague need, they respond to Vision. They also respond even more to thought-out Vision that has some practical framework, e.g "We have built relationships with a great bunch of 11-14's and now have an opportunity to run an Youth Emmaus course with the older ones and believe you could be a real blessing to that group and help to develop this ministry!"

3. GIVE DETAILS: Remember the church has a really really bad history with volunteers for youth work i.e if you got suckered into being a leader of a group there was NO escape unless you a) died or b) moved away! So if you do ask someone, let them know the expectations and timescale!

4. DON'T MAKE ASSUMPTIONS: Think wider than just trendy young 20's and the newly wed couple, there are great youthwork volunteers of all ages.

5. BUILD TEAMS: No one wants to be passed a crisis, however people do enjoy joining functional envisioned teams THAT enjoy what they do. In a good team people grow and develop in their faith, that's attractive. Teams allow you to recruit a more diverse mix of people too so greater pool to draw from.

6. OVERCOME FEAR: Remember that congregations are heavily influenced by media opinions of young people, they are often scared of them and AT the very least think "I could never talk to one of those TEENAGERS!" *quake* So ask one or two poeple to help with a one-off specific event where they encounter the young people and may be surprised to find themselves in conversation with young people. Get the young people involved in running an event for the congregation that'll will break down some barriers.

7. OUR SIDE OF THE DEAL: What support, resourcing, training, budget can the volunteer expect? Is there demonstrated commitment from those doing the recruiting or is the volunteer just going to be left to it with no budget or framework!

There's also a foundational stage. Have you created a place where volunteers are supported, valued and encouraged? Do the exisiting volunteers work with vision and creativity? If your support of existing volunteers is rubbish and no-one is allowed to EVER retire from a job .... then you've created a climate in which no-one would want to volunteer.