All NexGen Pro articles – Page 86
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IssuesYouth Work Lab: Self-directed learning
This year we’ve seen the Youthwork Summit, Youthwork the Conference and SoulNet all take time out from their regular slots in the Christian youth work training calendar. These conferences work hard at offering spaces that resource, inspire and challenge a nation of youth workers and they will be missed.
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IssuesYouth Work Lab: Mindfulness
Mindfulness has gone mainstream, even making the cover of Time Magazine. Over the last 20 years, mindfulness has stepped out of its religious roots, been secularised, simplified, and gone mainstream, to meet the need of the Western context. Mindfulness is fast becoming a go-to solution in the health service, occupational health and, increasingly, in education. There a number of resources, books, training courses and projects promoting mindfulness-based interventions and approaches.
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IssuesYouth Work Lab: Starting something new
Cuts, cuts and more cuts. We all know that the youth service, both statutory and voluntary, is being squeezed on a scale not seen for 50 years. There’s probably a youth service in your area which has had to reduce capacity or disappear altogether. We hear the constant refrain in the press that austerity has hit young people the hardest: youth unemployment is at an all-time high, as is the likelihood of young people living in low-income households (almost half a million of secondary school age young people live in poverty and poverty experienced in childhood is likely to carry on into adulthood).
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IssuesYouth Work Lab: Singing
Before youth work and youth ministry got off the ground, one key way of traditional churches involving young people in the life of the faith community was through a church choir. Early church choirs weren’t only about worship, they were also a place of education. Here young people, mainly boys, would be taught to read both music and words.
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IssuesYouth Work Lab: Parents
Sometimes they don’t engage at all, sometimes they criticise the things you say and do, sometimes they speak an encouraging word and it lifts you for the rest of the term. Youth workers may focus on the young people with the core of their roles, but the role of family in youth work should never be under-estimated. Young people remain the focus of our work, but neglecting the role families can play in the ministries we are a part of can result in missed opportunities to see greater wholeness.
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BlogA Knight to Remember
You might not expect contemplative spiritual exercises to be the lasting legacy of a 16th century Spanish knight, but Ignatius of Loyola was no ordinary Spaniard and no ordinary knight. We can press fast-forward on his wealthy upbringing as the youngest of 13 children, though you might be interested to know that he came to faith while recovering from a wound he sustained in the Italian War of 1521-26...
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Issues
Keep on keeping on
A few months ago I received a message from a boy I worked with in the early days of XLP. As youth workers we all know at least one kid that we are secretly dreading seeing again: this was that kid. He was a nightmare. But out of nowhere, he contacted me on Facebook saying, ‘You may remember that back then I wasn’t the best kid in school, but I have now seen sense and work as a police officer.’
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IssuesPick of the Month: Kisses from Katie
Katie Davis with Beth Clark - Authentic, 2012 £9.99 - One of the best resources i’ve ever engaged with.
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IssuesJustice as a Lifestyle
It’s a well-worn cliché to say that young people are passionate about justice – but what does that really mean? Matt Valler believes that while campaigns, lifestyle choices and fundraising events are of some value, we’ll never truly see the world change until justice becomes our way of life.
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IssuesJustice: The Soul of the Story
It was the height of summer. For a couple of weeks the rain abated and as the sun shone I sat inside – like millions of my fellow countryfolk – and munched on some cake while watching a few exceptional people achieve sporting greatness. If only I could run like that, I thought to myself, while licking the last of the icing from my plate.
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IssuesQ&A: Judah Smith
He leads of one of the biggest churches in the United States, is mates with sport stars, has written a best-selling book, and pastors Justin Bieber – but started off as a youth worker. Journalist Jamie Cutteridge meets Seattle’s Judah Smith.
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