…so Julie Andrews sang in Sound of Music. I love Julie Andrews, and woe betide me if I am the one to find a flaw in her magical musical numbers , but I wonder if the beginning is always the best place to start. Certainly, when it comes to counting, races and board games – starting at the beginning is a good idea. But sometimes we have to work from the end backwards, if we are truly to arrive at the destination we desire.
Imagine for a moment you could fast forward in time by 20 years, and meet the children in your groups as their adult selves. What would they be like? What would you hope to see? What would their priorities be? What would their lives look like? Now rewind ten years and see them as teenagers. What do they look like? How do they speak? What do they talk about? What are your hopes and dreams for them at this age?
It can be scary to think about the future of our children’s groups, and by extension, the future of the Church. But it’s important that we don’t shy away from the harsh and cold reality of the statistics before us. Looking around our churches today, the gender imbalance grows bigger and bigger. Either churches aren’t engaging men, or men aren’t engaging with church, or even both; but something needs to be done. The Church as it has been and as it is now hasn’t worked; we need to shake things up, starting with our children’s work.
We’ve asked Christian Vision for Men’s Carl Beech to think ahead to what the Church of the future is going to need in order to not only survive, but thrive when it comes to the men within it. From this, we asked him to work backwards to the children’s ministry churches need in order to nurture these men. Essentially, starting at the end and working back to the beginning. In the next issue we will be exploring the Christian woman of the future, and how we can best foster the faith of the girls in our midst. I encourage you to read Carl’s thoughts and consider them. Carl is passionate about the need to defeminise the Church, and it’s possible that you won’t agree with him. But what we can all agree on is the fact that boys and men are leaving the Church, and something needs to be done.
As children’s workers we need parallel vision: being fully present to the children as they are now, and enjoying all that they bring, but also never losing the perspective of the faith we are fostering in them. We have to consider not only whether or not the children in our groups will have faith in the future but what that faith will look like.
And sometimes, just sometimes, as people of vision, we must defy Julie - and start at the end.
