By: Heather Campbell, Diocesan Youth Minister
During Clergy Day in the spring of 2022, a group requested the revitalization of Diocesan Youth Ministry. The group stressed the importance of expanding beyond diocesan-wide events and providing individual congregations with support.
Following this gathering, the diocese hired Ministry Architects, a church consulting agency, to conduct a visioning process with the diocese. Ministry Architects collaborated with the diocese to establish the Youth Ministry Renovation Team, a team of individuals who worked together to conduct listening sessions and congregational censuses to determine the needs of the diocese. The individuals on this team were Rev. Ed Bird, Barbie Russell, Kelly Nickson, Melissa Chavez, Mizraim Lorenzo-Aguilar, Rev. Joél Muñoz, and Rev. Sam Vaught.
The Youth Ministry Renovation Team completed its efforts with the Diocesan Youth Ministry Summit in October. The event brought together 40 individuals, including youth, youth leaders, clergy, and parishioners from across the diocese. Together, we formulated a mission statement and identified six core values for Diocesan Youth Ministry.
During the Vision Summit, the lack of a full-time paid youth minister serving in any congregation within our diocese was highlighted in our conversations. Our work to address this calls us to be pragmatic, assist congregations in their individual contexts, and ensure that youth ministry support does not create additional burdens on congregational work. This is why we have created the following 5-year plan objectives:
- Youth Faith Formation – Create a collection of resources for youth faith formation and make it accessible to congregations of all sizes and locations.
- Youth Confirmation – Create a diocesan-wide youth confirmation preparation process and implement it with the first cohort in Fall 2024.
- Youth Organization Partnerships – Ensure that every congregation has developed or enhanced a relationship with at least one youth-serving organization.
- Youth Leader Formation – Launch a youth leader development program (called “Youth Ministry University”) to train and equip parishioners, staff, and volunteers from congregations of any size, with the first cohort in Fall 2024.
- Youth Ministry Investment – Create an endowment of $10 million to fund and support the mission and goals of youth ministry, at both the congregational and diocesan levels.
- Christian Parenting and Caregivers Initiative Grant – Following a deep listening and research process to understand the challenges parents face to disciple their children, we will equip parents across the diocese to address their challenges in parenting. Led by Dr. Brian Steensland, sociologist, professor, and Rite 13 leader at Trinity Indy, this research will begin in early 2024.
A full description of these goals, including flexible benchmarks is located on our Diocesan Youth Webpage.
Our next course of action involves assembling teams dedicated to each goal, enabling us to execute our plan effectively. We encourage both clergy and lay members of our diocese who are passionate about any specific goal to reach out to our Diocesan Youth Minister, Heather Campbell.
