JourneyOnline
Thanks for the hard truth
I want to commend Journey and particularly Rohan for the article about young adults in the February edition of Journey.
I thought it had some really good points and feeds into a critical conversation we have to have in the church around how to nurture young adults in their faith and how to build young adults into leaders or maybe even allow space for the young adults to lead. I used the article as a part of my report to Bremer Brisbane Presbytery and I am just really appreciative of you not being afraid to say some of these hard truths.
Thanks.
Rev Josie Neuendorff
Centenary Uniting Church
Perpetually a visitor
The article “Who are the 7%?” in the February 2015 edition of Journey was spot on. I came into the Uniting Church in South Australia as an 18-year-old after a couple of years in a youth group and quickly found myself running said youth group with the only other guy between the ages of 18 and 40.
It sounds counter-intuitive at first, but older people making such a fuss when a young person visits or starts attending a church can actually be a barrier to inclusion—if you’re always special, everyone’s always so amazed that you’re even there, it is hard to feel like part of the herd.
My wife and I are now at a church where we’re virtually the only under-50s, and have attended services there for about three years, but still get called “visitors” because we attend a couple of times a month rather than once per week.
Peri Strathearn
South Australia
(This letter was left as a comment on journeyonline.com.au)
Don’t go there
In response to your article “Shake, rattle and roll. How theological study can change your faith” (Journey, February 2015), I was heartbroken to read that people attending theological college would lose their faith and become atheists. If that’s what’s going to happen to you, don’t go, especially young people who are easily impressionable to academic teachings.
A person’s faith and trust in God is so precious to him. He does not want to see it ruined and them not even believing that he exists anymore.
The Bible is a deeply spiritual book and like our minister says “It’s not like academic texts”. And like Paul says in 1 Corinthians 1: 21a (NLT): “Since God in his wisdom saw to it that the world would never know him through human wisdom.”
Just read the Bible for what it is and it will bring you closer to God.
Miriam Bakker
Southport Uniting Church
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“Don’t go there”
I was brought up a Christian and at 80 years of age it disturb me to read the above article. On one occasion I heard a person was an atheist, I immediately felt sorrow for the person missing out on so much. It would be interesting to talk to one or the persons you refer to, to find out what caused that person to lose their faith. Let me tell you about the time the Holy Spirit took me to task. I had just put my wife in hospital for an operation. On the way back to the car I offered a prayer asking the Good Lord to take care of her. Do not ask me to explain but the words have been written into my memory, “Did I not give her to you stop worrying about here”. She came through fine.