The Millennial Exodus – An Article from South Korea

The article is entitled – Why young South Koreans are turning away from religion – Some churches are employing technology and becoming less hierarchical to try to entice and keep young members.

The article was interesting to me because it has similar features to the Millennial Exodus happening here in the United States.  According to the article, the reasons why South Koreans are leaving the faith…

  • Smartphones
  • Demanding Educational System
  • Unemployment
  • Church Hierarchy

Unfortunately, it appears that some churches are attempting to win them back by following the Western churches through hip music and pyrotechnics. 

Here are some additional resources about this topic.

 

Facebook is Seeking Authentic Community

I came across this article, and had to share it.  Facebook is now seeking how to develop community that is real and authentic.  Many churches are attempting to do the same thing – for a different reason.

At Facebook, mere “sharing” is getting old. Finding deeper meaning in online communities is the next big thing.

CEO Mark Zuckerberg is no longer satisfied with just connecting the world so that people can pass around baby pictures and live video — or fake news and hate symbols. So the Facebook founder wants to bring more meaning to its nearly 2 billion users by shepherding them into online groups that bring together people with common passions, problems and ambitions.

In this Wednesday, June 21, 2017, photo, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, right, talks with Facebook group administrators Lola Omolola, left, Erin Schatteman, second from left, and Janet Sanchez during the Facebook Communities Summit, in Chicago, in advance of announcement of a new Facebook initiative designed to spur people to form more meaningful communities with Facebook's groups feature. (AP Photo/Nam Y. Huh)

Here is the full article.

The article explains how their leadership team is seeking to move Facebook from social sharing into communities where people find genuine community.  Community is powerful.  As humans, we were created to be in community with one another.  The ability to develop a community is so essential, that I present it as one of the basic developmental factors of adulthood. 

Facebook is facing an uphill battle.  While still the largest (by far) of the social media platforms, Facebook is facing decline among today’s adolescents and emerging adults who prefer to use Snapchat or Instagram.  This decline in popularity is causing them to rethink social media.

The main cause for this change is money.  Facebook made $27 billion dollars on advertising last year.  The longer that people stay on Facebook, the more income that they produce.

According to Anita Blanchard, virtual communities “can fill a fundamental need we have for a sense of belonging, much like eating or sleeping.”  The real hurdle for building authentic community is whether virtual communities, can truly provide undivided attention, a warm embrace, or help when your car won’t start.

If you are looking for a virtual community to join, check out the EA Network – a network of people who desire to minister to the needs of emerging adults.

Related articles:

 

Dr. G. David Boyd is the Founder of EA Resources, and the EA Network.  If he can help you minister to the emerging adults in your life, contact him at gdavid@earesources.org.

 

Professor’s response to student’s absence: Bring the baby

 

Morgan King and her daughter, Korbyn, pose for a picture. Morgan's professor offered to take care of Korbyn during class whenever King is unable to find childcare.

© Submitted by Morgan King

A University of Tennessee student got a heart-warming surprise when she emailed her professor about missing class last week.

 

Morgan King, who studies therapeutic recreation, emailed her professor, Sally Hunter, on June 15 to tell her she had had to miss class the day before because she couldn’t find child care for her daughter, Korbyn.

Read the rest of the story – here.

While many of today’s emerging adults are waiting to have children, it is important to know how to treat these young parents in today’s culture.

The reason that the story went viral is due to a professor embracing the challenges of an emerging adult.  Instead of telling the young mother to suck it up (or calling call her lazy and self-centered), this professor responded with a heart of service.

How can churches respond in the same way to today’s young adults?

Here is an article where I discuss how Millennials are now having children, and how the church can respond to serve them.

Dr. G. David Boyd is the Managing Director of EA Resources.  He is the founder of the EA Network.  If he can help you and your community ministry to the emerging adults in your community, please contact him at gdavid@earesources.org.

Quite a Few ‘Emerging Adults’ Are Smoking Pot Every Day

I found this article concerning marijuana use among emerging adults – and wanted to pass it along.

 

Credit: Rafael Castillo

Recently, The Lancet published the first-ever report of marijuana use by Americans aged 12 and over between 2002 and 2014 using data from the National Survey on Drug Use and Health. The data and a discussion of their public health implications are included as part of the CDC’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report.

A lot changed, marijuana-wise, between 2002 and 2014. State laws related to marijuana loosened considerably. Public support for legalization climbed significantly. And public perception of risk of using marijuana dropped off. How have these changes affected marijuana use and addiction?

Here is the complete article.

Almost 7% of emerging adults report using marijuana on a DAILY basis.  Those who report alcohol abuse is about 12%.  As those who minister to emerging adults, we need to be aware of this trend, and know how to respond.

The rise of marijuana and alcohol in this life phase could be due to several factors including:

  • newly acquired income
  • access to the “forbidden fruit” as they step into adulthood
  • independence from family
  • stress due to their high mobility rate and characteristics of this life phase

The article encourages those around them to ask them about marijuana use.

 

 

 

Hatred for that Cat in the Cradle.

I listen to various types of music – disco, Motown, classic rock, and current tunes.  There are very few classic songs that I do not love.

However, there is one song that I have hated my entire life.  A song that makes my skin crawl.  A song that will always make me change the radio station.  “Cat’s in the Cradle” is a 1974 folk rock song by Harry Chapin from the album Verities & Balderdash. 

The song is too depressing, and I still hate it.  Apparently my children feel the same way, because they now throw a fit anytime they hear it.

The song was highlighted in an episode of the Middle.

Here is the original scene.  I am a fan of the Middle – Here is a post that I dedicated to the show.   The Middle will give parents an outside perspective of the issues facing emerging adults – with ALOT of laughter.

The second video definitely lightens the mood.  Here is the video.

While in the midst of raising your children, remember that like other life stages – emerging adulthood has its trials and blessings.

Remember to minimize the trials, and focus on the blessings. 

 

 

I came across a neat resource put out by the Faith Communities Today national surveys of American congregations.  The resource is produced by Kristina Lizardy-Hajbi, Director of the Center for Analytics, Research and Data in the United Church of Christ.

Click here to see the full resource.

Here were two interesting quotes from the paper.

  • In general, congregations that increased young adult participation over the last three years gained an average of nearly 20 young adults per congregation (with an increase of five young adults being the most frequent number reported).
  • Other characteristics of critical mass young adult congregations include higher likelihoods that the majority of regularly participating adults are theologically conservative the congregation has higher percentages of children and youth, and the congregation prioritizes engaging young adults.

If you want to attract emerging adults.  You must prioritize emerging adults.  Rather than giving lip-service to reaching young adults, the priorities of your church are revealed through your website and other forms of communications, budget, and staffing.

Dr. G. David Boyd is the Managing Director of EA Resources.  He is the founder of the EA Network.  If he can help you and your community ministry to the emerging adults in your community, please contact him at gdavid@earesources.org.

 

Young People Are Leading the Way. Will The Church Follow?

I read this article over the weekend, and wanted to share it with the EA Network.  The title of the article is fascinates me.  Instead of assuming that we ask emerging adults to lead the church, we should assume that they are already leading the church.  We should then ask the question, “Where are they leading us?”

The answer is simply that many of them are leaving established religious organizations.  There is plenty of research to support this fact – which I often refer to the Millennial Exodus.  If you want to read about the Millennial Exodus, and read stories of why they are leaving, search the website under Millennial Exodus.

Here is the article.

Most of the studies I have seen on young adults and faith indicate that young people are leaving the church in record numbers. According to the source, anywhere from 60-70% of young people drop out of church in their college years. Almost weekly another article surfaces explaining the latest reasons young people are leaving churches. Surely there is a lot to lament here, but I’m not sure these doomsday reports tell the full story.

Click here for the rest of the story.

 

 

Church Plants and Emerging Adults

I came across an article about how church plants are reaching emerging adults.

Sunday services at Five14 Church begin loud.

Worshippers are greeted into with heavy bass and synth beats. The morning starts off with a game, delivered by a standup comedian. At the nondenominational New Albany church, this is gospel.

Read the full article.

Here are a few highlights:

  • The number of adults in the U.S. who say they believe in God or regularly attend a religious service has been on the decline for years nationwide, but is on the rise in Ohio. 
  • They get a lot of explorers – people just looking for a deeper meaning to life, but who are not sure where to find it.
  • “I think if they decided to bring a really aggressive anti-LGBT, anti-self-expression, that might be an issue,” Brunsman says. (Someone who lives in the local community’s view of the new church.)
  • “[The Church] needs to be incarnate on the Internet.”

Other characteristics of this church includes – a relaxed, authentic atmosphere, loud and up-beat music, and an understanding that attenders may not be knowledgeable of Christianity. While these characteristics are not essential for attracting emerging adults, these communities have found a winning recipe for reversing the Millennial Exodus.

What do you think attracts emerging adults to a spiritual community?

Dr. G. David Boyd is the Managing Director of EA Resources, a non profit designed to equip churches and parents to minister to emerging adults.

As more people claim to be “spiritual” more than religious, what exactly does that mean?

While in Johnson City, Tennessee, I began a conversation with a shuttle driver named Jeff.  He asked me why I was in town.  I explained I was speaking at a church, and said that he “hoped it was full of the Spirit.” 

I began asking him about his studies.  Jeff shared about his major, and what he wanted to do when he was done with college.  He was more than eager to talk about his life experiences, and how they had shaped him.  He was extremely articulate, and well-read in various philosophies. 

At some point during the conversation, I asked Jeff if he was religious.  He began by stating that his father was Jewish, and that his mother was Catholic, but neither of his parents actively participated in their faith.  He was not a believer in either religion, but stated that he was indeed spiritual. 

I then asked Jeff what “spiritual” meant to him.  Rather than put words to it, he gave me an example.  He stated that the evening before, there had been a banquet at the hotel.  After the event, there were left-over sandwiches.  He took these extra sandwiches and took them to people who were in need.  He stated that after this experience, he felt so good. 

I asked then how that was spiritual.  Jeff thought about it, and simply said that it had to do with the emotion associated with the action that he had done.  His emotional experience (due to his moral behavior), was the foundation of his recent spirituality. 

Jeff did not mention a belief in any god, or in anything supernatural. 

It has been stated that Millennials are spiritual, but not religious. 

A survey by the Pew Research Center’s Forum on Religion & Public Life, finds that many of the country’s 46 million unaffiliated adults are religious or spiritual in some way. Two-thirds of them say they believe in God (68%). More than half say they often feel a deep connection with nature and the earth (58%), while more than a third classify themselves as “spiritual” but not “religious” (37%), and one-in-five (21%) say they pray every day. (Source)

Often little definition is given to this expression “spiritual.”  For someone who has grown up in the church, I often have understood the term to mean that they believed in some form of spiritual reality that usually contained a concept of God, but they were not interested in organized religion.  After meeting Jeff, my understanding of “spiritual, but not religious” has changed.

Many emerging adults who have not had a connection with a religious belief system do not even have a concept of the word spiritual.  The word spiritual is a word that is often limited to those with a religious background.

Here is what I learned from Jeff.

We should avoid more than our Christian clichés.  While Christian platitudes are painful to even to church-attenders, the use of words like spiritual immediately highlight the distance between us.  Evangelism tools such as The Four Spiritual Laws by Bill Bright, assume that the person you are sharing with has a general concept of religion.  As more emerging adults in the United States have been raised without a Christian worldview, the vocabulary that we use in dialogue with them might leave both sides confused.

Ask questions.  Emerging adults have no problem entering into dialogue with others about faith or religious beliefs.  From their perspective, diversity brings beauty to our world, and strength to our communities.  Dialogue can also help them learn and understand the viewpoints of others.

Spiritual, but not religious could refer to anything from a devout Christ-follower who avoids churches to someone like Jeff who simply feels good as he reflects on his own moral behavior.

Dr. G. David Boyd is the Managing Director of EA Resources, a nonprofit designed to equip parents and churches to minister to the needs of emerging adults.  He is also the founder of the EA Network, a group of individuals seeking to work together to understand and minister to emerging adults.  If Dr. Boyd can equip your community to reach emerging adults, contact him at gdavid@earesources.org.

Financing College – Taking Time to Laugh

Financing college can be difficult and stressful.  If you are in the midst of putting together a plan to finance an education, take some time to laugh.  Here is a great clip from the Middle, a show that is a must-watch for parents of emerging adults.

Check out this clip from the Middle.

Here are some additional articles that talk about finances.

Dr. G. David Boyd is the Managing Director of EA Resources, and the Founder of the EA Network.  If he can help your community understand and minister to emerging adults, please contact him at gdavid@earesources.org.