2018: The Year of Being "Generations Together"

As each new year begins, I usually receive a series of phone calls in my office, each of which goes something like this:

Caller: Hi Jonathan, it’s Father Fred from St Swithin’s here. We’ve just had a parish visioning day and we’ve identified youth and children’s ministry as one of our top three strategic priorities. We’ve looked around and realised we need to start a youth group and a kids club ASAP, so how do we do that?

Me: This is all good to hear but let me ask you this: how often in your church do you have different generations doing something together at the same time?

Caller: Basically never, because people wouldn’t enjoy it. Each generation wants to do what it likes doing. Kids want to run around, oldies want to sit and chat. You know how it is – they all have their own needs!

Me: Do you remember doing good things at church a long time ago where all the generations were together?

Caller: Sure, we used to do all kinds of things – all-age Mothering Sunday services, picnics, cooking and delivering meals, family camps…  Now that you mention it, I wonder why we stopped doing all that?

And so the conversation continues. We all know there is nothing new under the Sun, but what is remarkable is that many of us seem to have forgotten the benefits of doing church in an intergenerational way. By “intergenerational”, I mean intentionally (deliberately) bringing two or more generations together to do things like foster relationships; share faith stories; incorporate all generations in worship; develop service projects that involve all ages; and engage all generations in learning together. It means more than just placing the generations side by side: it’s about designing ways for different generations to be listening to each other and learning from each other.

Scripture and tradition tell us that this approach has been a feature of Judeo-Christian religious life for a very long time, and yet, it has somehow disappeared in recent decades as ‘generational ministry’ became a professional specialty – younger generations left the church (literally) to engage in activities by themselves, and I think this happened so frequently that eventually young people came to believe that they didn’t belong with the rest of the church. Is it a coincidence that recent decades have also seen a profound decline in the number of young people attending church beyond childhood?

The Bible does not make any reference to age segregation in the life and worship of Christian communities, leading a colleague of mine from another denomination to tell me he thinks such segregation within our churches is a form of sin!  Instead, Holly Allen and Christine Ross in their magnificent Intergenerational Christian Formation: Bringing the Whole Church Together in Ministry, Community and Worship (IVP, 2012) list fourteen pages of biblical passages reflecting an intergenerational outlook: from Deuteronomy 31 (“Assemble the people, men, women and little ones…that they may hear and learn to fear the LORD your God”) to Psalm 145 (“one generation commends your works to another; they tell of your mighty acts”) to Acts 21 (“we departed and went on our journey, and they all, with wives and children, accompanied us until we were outside the city”).  Allen and Ross make a compelling case for the need to rediscover the intergenerational approach of the early and not-so-early churches.

I should point out that no one (or not many) is seeking a complete stop to Sunday Schools and youth services, because there is some truth in the need at times for age-appropriate activities and bonding with people your own age. But the influence of academics in the 70s and 80s who wanted to shape church life to reflect the cognitive needs of different age groups went too far, because someone’s stage of faith development or “spiritual age” does not necessarily match their chronological age. So, I argue that the major point of focus in your church programming should be on bringing the generations together whenever possible.

There are many ways of adopting an intergenerational approach in a church, school or workplace, and over the course of this year of exploring what it means to be “Generations Together”, we’ll be hearing much more about successful intergenerational programs and approaches from not only our Diocese, but from around the world.

John Roberto is an American writer and presenter who is acknowledged as one of the world’s leading exponents of intergenerational ministry, and his websites (e.g. www.lifelongfaith.com) are full of free, curated resources and practical ideas as to how to achieve excellent all-age ministry in virtually any conceivable context. What’s especially exciting is that John Roberto will be joining us as the guest speaker at the Provincial Clergy Conference and Lay Conference in early August. I believe John’s presentations will be truly transformative moments in the life of our diocese, as he outlines his findings from a lifetime of study of models of faith formation, and suggests exactly how they could be implemented in your context.

Some ACSQ churches have already discovered the benefits of adopting an intergenerational mindset, and I look forward to sharing their stories throughout the year. For example, catering to “All Ages” is one of the core values of “Messy Church” which is working successfully in many parishes, while others are enjoying the creation of all-age or “all-in” worship services. The Roscoe Library at St Francis College Milton has many books on the subject, as well as numerous other resources to help you make your church more intergenerational in its flavour, and of course our AYCF team is always happy to advise each parish specifically.

I am already looking forward with excitement to where the year of being “Generations Together” will take us, individually and collectively. If the impact of intentional focus on this area is as great as I predict it will be, then I anticipate 2019 will be the year when the first phone calls I receive are less about asking me for ideas on how to work with segregated groups of youth and children, and more about sharing experiences of how an intergenerational approach has brought growth in faith, service, generosity and numbers.