Passing the torch
By Kevin Driscoll

While my first Christmas with my first son was special, I am still riding high from spending four wonderful days with a whole lot of other people’s kids.

Sister Jude Ruggeri and I accompanied a delegation of nearly 50 teen-agers and youth ministers to the National Catholic Youth Conference in Indianapolis, Indiana. The Diocese of Palm Beach delegation joined over 24,000 of their peers.

A big thank you to all of the adults who gave of themselves to give our young people an experience they won’t soon forget. You can’t fly a large group of teenagers to chilly Indiana, put them in a hotel in a busy downtown area, and register them for a conference with thousands of potential dating partners without the help of a lot of seasoned veterans!

At NCYC, the young people listen to amazing keynote speakers, participate in engaging workshop sessions, experience overwhelming prayer services and liturgies, and mingle with other Catholic teens from every corner of our nation. At the closing liturgy, as the 24,000 created such awe-inspiring prayerful silence, I thought to myself, as I had throughout the conference, “Where will they be in ten years?”

That’s the kind of simple yet humbling, gut-checking question that should be framed and hung on a wall by every adult working with adolescents everywhere.

I spotted my old youth minister manning his booth at the conference’s large vendor area. Doug Brummel now tours the country performing family-themed parish missions, as well as keynote performances at national and regional youth ministry gatherings.

Ten years ago, he was just Doug, a parish youth minister at little St. Anne’s in Oswego, Illinois. It was his first job in ministry, and about the same time I moved on to college, Doug moved on in his ministry, too, laying the groundwork for his ever-evolving mission of using his God-given gifts of leadership, humor, music, and theatrics to inspire thousands of families each year.

We spent some time at NCYC talking about just what went right ten years ago in that sleepy little town. We thought about our teen leadership committee. I’m an assistant diocesan director of youth & young adult ministry and write for a Catholic newspaper. Todd is a parish youth minister. Alicia works with special education students. Kyna is an active volunteer in her parish’s youth programs. We counted five, including my wife, who became teachers. Even one of Doug’s adult volunteers went on to become a diocesan director of youth ministry herself.

While I consider my youth minister to be one of the most influential people to touch my life, he himself is quick to point out that while he may have been steering the ship, the waters of the Holy Spirit were guiding the boat along. To painfully continue this analogy, there came a time when we as graduating high school students had to sink or swim.

And so it is as we adults search for ways to better minister to adolescents, we ask ourselves if we are passing the torch of our faith when it is time to turn them loose on the world.

God calls us all to a life of service in His church. For me, I realized I was called to a life of lay ecclesial ministry, and my ability to “do” ministry was given to me long before I ever accepted a position. I am convinced my enthusiasm for my vocation—my career—was born out of that “sink or swim” struggle.

The United States Bishops’ document on youth ministry calls for church leaders to create an environment of ministry that is to, with, by, and for teen-agers. So often I see—both in our own diocese and nationally—youth ministers, adult volunteers, catechists, teachers, et al, who are content with ministry that is simply to and for teens. A lot of adults spend a lot of time creating sessions, planning meetings, creating props, gathering and performing music, designing beautiful prayer and liturgy experiences, and then unfortunately fail to call forth those young people to do all that work themselves. Perhaps it is because as adults we just don’t want them to stumble, or even fail.

I have a fear. It’s that young people who are not given the with and by part of ministry will become young adults who sit back in their pews and wonder why the church isn’t reaching out to them anymore. I fear that a significant number of those thousands who gathered in Indianapolis just don’t quite understand that “church” is a verb, and that verb is doing.

I believe I work for the church today because I worked for the church as a young, impressionable adolescent. I encourage adults working in ministry with adolescents to give our young people the opportunity to sink or swim. Let them mispronounce a word as they lector, or create a less-than-perfect prayer service. God forgives, and perhaps in ten years that kid who tripped over the word “Corinthians” will be writing this column.

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