How We Make Relational Ministry Impossible

“After the program, tonight, can you drive James home?” The parent was a friend and needed a favor. He couldn’t pick up his son, who was in my ministry, and needed a favor. I remember thinking, “Wow, how do I tell him that I can’t or shouldn’t?” I remember wondering, “How do I tell this friend who trusts me that if his son got in a car with me without another adult that I’d be violating protocol?”

I didn’t tell him. Instead, I made an excuse as to why I couldn’t. My friend replied, “No problem.” and he found someone else to drive home his son. I might not have been the most reliable friend, but at least I was following the rules?

It’s frustrating when we’re called to accompany young people and develop relational ministry with a whole bunch of conditions. While healthy relationships do require boundaries, I think we’ve professionalized relational ministry to a point where authenticity dies. We’ve created a surface community when God’s calling us to go deep.

It would be easy for me to point the finger and blame the institutions that mandate the protocol; however, I think we all need to own the situation and have a different conversation. The discussion has to go from how to CREATE SAFE ENVIRONMENTS to how to CREATE HEALTHY RELATIONSHIPS. And to get there, we need:

PROPER FORMATION FOR PROFESSIONALS

There is plenty of training on identifying the signs of abuse and neglect; however, not enough on how to build and form healthy relationships. At the same time, we’ve created so many programs in our parishes that we’re too busy to learn. The formation is crucial because it allows us to learn and practice skills like:

• Active and empathetic listening
• Managing conflict and facilitating deep conversations
• Praying with and for members of your congregation

When it comes to those who specifically work with young people, we need to show them how to engage the families. At Baptismal prep, we should show parents what it looks like to surround your family with a community that cares about your relationship with Christ. By focusing on formation for our leaders, we go from preventive to proactive measures, which will lead to deeper, more Christ-like relationships.

AN ALL IN APPROACH FROM THE CONGREGATION

Youth ministry is the responsibility of the community;  however, the burden is consistently placed on the shoulders of a few. The reason safe relationships are challenging to facilitate is that the current paradigm of youth ministry doesn’t allow for multiple adults to work with parents on the formation of their child.

If I surround my son with five people in his life, and I not only know them, but they know each other, it’s created accountability. It’s also given my son people he can go to if he can’t talk with his mother or me. In the church, we create these isolated pockets with no communication. If parents don’t know who is mentoring their kid and that’s not good.

To change this, we need to clarify the value of being an intergenerational community. The message of working together can start during Baptismal classes or marriage preparation. When people enroll in the parish, we can talk about how we come alongside their families and how they can walk with others. When you have an all-in approach, you create natural accountability that won’t shut down deep relationships from occurring.

A CALL TO FACE OUR FEARS

The reason we’ve created so many conditions on our relational ministry is that we are afraid of getting hurt. It does not matter how many limitations we put around relational ministry people will still get hurt because we live in a broken world. The question is whether our conditions prevent or create more hurt.  What I do know is that fear is going to limit how much we open ourselves up to one another, which means we’re left to deal with our emotions and burdens on our own.

Formation and communication can help us through the fear; however, we also need to bring them to God. As a community, we need to address these fears through prayer and the sacraments. We have to trust that even though we might get hurt that the victims won’t be rejected or judged. We have to believe that God will and can bring healing. If we allow fear to dictate our relationships, then we’ll never grow.

People are not leaving the church because your social media strategy is weak, or the games you play are lame. They are leaving because they are searching for community and relationships that affirm them to be who God has called them to be. Before we start creating more content and resources, let’s start a discussion on what real relational ministry in a church community should look like.

I know this post only scratches the surface and doesn’t provide many solutions. Still, my hope is that we start a dialogue that helps us accompany, mentor, and invest in the next generation of disciples. Will you join me?

What ideas do you have for creating a true relational ministry for the next generation?