Youth Church (2)
Following up the last post on the youth church thing.
Jonathan suggested that the shift in emphasis from "youth church" to "emerging church" was about a:
"discovery that the need for new ways of doing and being church was felt not just by young people but also by older generations. So the distinguishing factor ceased to be age, and became outlook, approach, style"
That kind of summarises how my personal thought process, from working with youth to asking bigger "church" questions. I hope that is the reality in terms of youth church, but the cynic in me wonders if it is still about trends and bandwaggons?

In terms of how I answered some of the questions I was asked, here are my quick thoughts:

• How would you define a youth church? What distinguishes it from a “normal” multi-generational church?

For me the definition of a youth church is an attempt to inculturate the Gospel and function as a church within the structures and paradigms of a particular localised youth culture.

I think it was Graham Cray who suggested something like that we think in terms of these being the first churches of a new generation rather than a single generation church.

They differ from multi-generational churches by being focused on the culture and patterns of young people and youth culture, although there may be older people who relate more to such an expression than they do existing “inherited” churches.

• From your experience and observation, are most youth churches in England youth groups of existing churches who want their own worship service or are they church plants into the youth culture?

At the moment most are congregations of existing churches. This is far more common than church planting.

There have been some attempts to plant, but usually out of strong relationship with the “mother” church

More for another post I think!