When I started in pastoral ministry as a young youth minister, I remember the thing I feared most was parents. With the age and experience differential between us, it sometimes felt like they were the enemy. They critiqued my programs and methodologies (which needed criticism), they couldn’t get permission slips and payments in on time, and they just seemed, well, intimidating.
Let’s be honest: I had a bad attitude toward parents when I started my first parish job.
Still, I knew they were key. This was before all the data from the National Study on Youth and Religion (NSYR) came out. This was just before all the books about partnering with parents and family-based youth ministry were published.
I just knew something simple: if parents were not on my side, then I would not be able to effectively minister to young people. So, I did the most uncomfortable thing I could: I spent time trying to get to know the parents of the young people I served.
In the 25 years since my first year in ministry, this point has become more and more clear, with books and data galore to back up this simple claim: When it comes to forming children and youth in the faith, parents matter.
And, if we are honest with ourselves, not only do we know that parents matter, but we know that parents matter way more than our flashy ministry programs, awesome music, and incredible curriculum.
In the book Families at the Center of Faith Formation (2016), John Roberto and his co-authors write that we need to create new attitudes and assumptions about ministry in the 21st century. In a nutshell, they say:
- Home is the essential and foundational environment.
- We must reinforce the family’s central role.
- We need to address the diversity of family life.
- We have to partner with parents in working toward shared goals.
They go on to say: “We must resist the temptation to assume that families have failed to do their jobs if children don’t follow the path of their parents” (15).
I’ve discovered that I have an attitude problem: I have, in the past, treated parents as the problem. How many times have we said (or thought), “I can’t believe this kid doesn’t know her basic prayers?” Or, “Why don’t they just come to Mass?” Or, “Just turn in the d*$% paperwork!”
This requires an internal shift. Before we can begin to be effective in ministry with parents and families, we must examine our own attitude and truly come to believe this statement: Parents are the solution.
This takes prayer and reflection. It takes dumping whatever baggage you have in your head, and previous negative experiences with parents, that taints your view of them. In the end, if we think parents are the problem, parents will feel that energy. A distance will be built because parents won’t trust us. They won’t necessarily know why, but they will feel it in their hearts and intuition.
In the end, it comes to this: Good children’s and youth ministry is good family ministry. If you are not ministering with the parents, you are not doing good ministry.
Ouch.
Question: What is one negative experience with parents that you are holding on to? Can you give that experience to God and allow Him to change your heart?
I need to do the same.
