The document provides information about the upcoming ELCA Youth Gathering event, including the theme of practicing discipleship through peacemaking and justice. It notes that the new website for the gathering will launch this week and that housing will be assigned before the Extravaganza event in February. The daily schedule is also outlined, with events taking place in and around the Superdome in New Orleans from Wednesday through Sunday.
24. Extravaganza 2012 Sheraton – New Orleans February 8-12 Feb 8-9: Intensive Care Courses Feb 9-12: Main Event
25. Tuesday, September 20 1pm central time Guest: Karen Stevenson Topic: Talking with your Young People about Sexuality www.elcaymnet.org/3tc
Notas do Editor
The way our church understands its mission can be summed up in the word “accompaniment.” We believe it is our call and privilege as people deeply blessed by God to accompany people in their suffering, their joys, their pain and sorrows. The way of accompaniment is something that we are attempting to model by choosing to return to New Orleans in 2012. We hope to communicate to the people of New Orleans, and to ourselves, that we are a church that values relationships. From what we heard, New Orleans residents benefited from our accompaniment in 2009, and the lives of ELCA youth, their families, friends, and congregations were also changed.
The way our church understands its mission can be summed up in the word “accompaniment.” We believe it is our call and privilege as people deeply blessed by God to accompany people in their suffering, their joys, their pain and sorrows. The way of accompaniment is something that we are attempting to model by choosing to return to New Orleans in 2012. We hope to communicate to the people of New Orleans, and to ourselves, that we are a church that values relationships. From what we heard, New Orleans residents benefited from our accompaniment in 2009, and the lives of ELCA youth, their families, friends, and congregations were also changed.
Mostly our lives were changed by the hospitality of New Orleanians. In true New Orleans style, we were welcomed to the table like honored guests. Our young people were affirmed, thanked, offered expressions of gratitude, and for the most part, returned home to tell about a real life experience of grace.
I saw a video once in which Dooky Chase, a famous New Orleans chef, said that when company came unexpectedly, she just “baptized the gumbo” and welcomed her guests to the table.
That is what it feels like returning to New Orleans. The first time we were welcomed into the dining room, but because of the trust we have built, and the faith they have shown in us – might I be so bold as to say our mutual love – this time we feel like we are being welcomed into the kitchen like family. Metaphorically, in the kitchen, ELCA young people will learn what goes into making a meal. In other words, we want our young people to learn what’s behind that which they see and hear and experience in New Orleans. Through the community service in 2009, we hoped God would open our eyes and hearts to the struggle and pain of our neighbors. We hoped we would model a kind of radical discipleship after Jesus who emptied himself taking the form of a servant. It’s hard to lay aside our own Egos and orient our lives completely for the benefit of another, especially over a period of time, but our text for 2012 tells us that Jesus has done that for us. Because Jesus broke down the walls of hostility, and made us into “one new humanity,” we are able to live together peacefully, in a just society where power is shared and all people are treated with human dignity and rights according to the teachings of Jesus.
So we return in 2012, “citizens with the saints,” hoping to partner with the ways God is already active there to abolish the systems of injustice that keep people from having full access to the life Jesus promised.
The theme verse comes from the New Testament book of Ephesians. The Apostle Paul lays it out fairly clearly: People will know if you are a follower of Jesus when your encounter with others includes an offer of peace. Peace is not our human instinct, which is why it must be cultivated and grown in us. We hope to cultivate the practice of peacemaking through the ministry of the Youth Gathering next summer.
And peace, we know, is not just about the absence of conflict; it’s also about the presence of justice. God’s peace is about being able to recognize in the face of the marginalized our own faces, and in the hands of the oppressors our own hands. We want young people to learn about the systems that we are part of that keep people in poverty in New Orleans and in their home town. We all want to learn how we can practice peacemaking by advocating for the dignity of all of God’s creation.
When young people share in some game playing with children, we want them to think about the specific social and economic circumstances that contribute to a healthy childhood, and ask what they can do to ensure that all children here in their home town have the resources and support to grow to their full capacities.
Alongside the practice of peacemaking, we will attempt to “practice justice.” There will be service opportunities in 2012, but we are calling them “justice experiences.” We changed from service to justice because the concept of service for many of us means going somewhere and doing something. And, of course it does. This generation of adolescents engage in service activities more than any previous generation. But we don’t want ours to be a one-time service project. We want to build a relationship, and invest in changing the systems that keep some people disempowered.
In December, the first of six pre-Gathering learning sessions will be available online. Those of you who have attended Gatherings in the past know this as the “Getting Ready” materials. The team that is working on this material is making sure it is accessible to everyone, whether you can devote 6 months to the prep, doing one session per month, or six hours, on the bus as you approach New Orleans, or six minutes in your hotel room once you’ve arrived. All of the materials will remind us that the Gospel story that animates the church is about self-giving love. That is a challenging message for American teenagers and adults to embrace. Most of us would rather invoke the power of our collective American determination to fix problems in the way we think best than share power so all benefit. Jesus’ example of sacrificial love goes against the grain of can-do American individualism. We have heard from group leaders that their young people want to get dirty when they are in New Orleans , that they want to fix something rather than sit in a session learning about something. If you are struggling to “sell” the Gathering to youth who want to do something, I encourage you to read the Director’s blog about the theology of glory and the theology of the cross. www.blogs.elca.org
Maybe we can learn about God’s justice when a gifted musician tells us how hard it is to live without health insurance, especially when the only hospital that would accept people without insurance isn’t opening again.
Or maybe we learn about God’s justice when our eyes are opened to the disparities in this country regarding access to a good education.
In the end, we hope ELCA youth see themselves as citizens – friends – brothers – sisters – one new humanity, with the saints!
And ultimately we learn that to be advocates for peace with justice is what God called us to be in our baptism into Christ.
People who, as followers of Jesus, humble ourselves, to wash the feet of others, even those whose feet we wouldn’t choose to wash.
As people who offer our hands willingly to God’s service.
As people who listen before speaking, and work toward reconciliation in Christ in all relationships.
So this is my hope for the young people and adults who come together in New Orleans next summer learn how to….love like Jesus by practicing discipleship through peacemaking that works for justice. And I hope New Orleans will be strengthened in the process.
As the Rebirth Jazz Band taught us in 2009, jazz and the sense of the divine are both feelings deep inside us and both require expression. ELCA youth and adults will go to New Orleans to practice their faith and tell others about it later. They will bear witness to hope still alive in New Orleans, and, by God’s grace, start to live in a way that keeps hope alive in their home towns.
Registration opens October 9, but you can start to complete the forms now. They are available on our Facebook page and will be posted on our new website soon. Then, on Oct. 9 the information can be submitted. So just a touch of the button and you are done. No longer will you have to sit for hours at your computer at midnight entering information.
