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My first draft of this was over ten pages. I hope you experience the grace that went into cutting it in half.
Over the last week I have seen so many brave people enter forward with stories of the ways in which YoungLife has hurt them. I feel it is important to say none of these stories acquire shocked or surprised me. Each person who has shared their story admits that the history they have with YoungLife is complicated. I too include fond memories of YoungLife, and I too possess lasting hurt from YoungLife. I encourage you to read and give priority to the stories appearing with the hasthtag #DoBetterYoungLife. Their voices are crucial and their experiences say to a pain that I can never life. But based on these stories and on my own personal experiences in YoungLife, I too link in their call in compelling the ministry to do better.
I was 13 years old when YoungLife first entered my nature and it became the companion to my existence until I was 27. For nearly fifteen years, half of my whole life, I was a proud participant, volunteer, and employee. Nearly all of my good friends I owe to YoungLife. The most joyful High University and College experience I owe to YoungLife. I work in minis
(RNS) — Kent Thomas’ parents and sister grew up as members of Juvenile Life, the international evangelical ministry for kids and young adults, and at 24 years old, Thomas, too, was well on his way to becoming a Young Life “lifer.” He attended one of the organization’s camps through middle school and later stepped up Young Life’s ladder of intern, commander, work crew member, summer guide and eventually mountain guide at Beyond Malibu, a Young Life camp in the mountains of British Columbia.
Raised a Christian in Tacoma, Wash., Thomas said the camp was the place where he found “the most feeling of family and creature known that I’ve ever felt.”
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But that sense of belonging was shaken when the organization’s national office told Thomas, in an email, that he couldn’t be a Young Life leader because he was a male lover man in a relationship.
Almost six years later, the rejection haunts him. “I still have dreams about Young Life at least once a week,” said Thomas, now 30. “Sometimes I’m being welcomed as a queer person, sometimes I’m being ostracized as a queer person.”
In July, after Beyond Mal
Critics Demand Young Animation “Fully Affirm Gay Relationships”
A prominent ecumenical Christian ministry is facing criticism from a group of former staff and volunteers who contend that the nearly 80-year-old organization should open leadership roles to those in same-sex relationships.
Young Experience, the Colorado Springs-based parachurch ministry, operates camps and outreach to teens and young adults across more than 100 countries. It is unclear how extensive or organized the LGBT-affirming pressure campaign is. Religion News Service (RNS) reports this week that it took shape in July as a grassroots campaign that has grow a “movement” – citing more than 6,700 signatures for a change.org petition seeking for Youthful Life to repeal its sexual behavior policy.
It is unclear how many of the signatories hold a connection with Young Life, which counts approximately 348,000 youth “involved weekly around the world.” The organization has a broad arrive to students in middle school, steep school and college. Further, special ministries seek to extend teen moms and teens with disabilities. Young Life counts “more than 80,000 staff and volunteers in 104 countries” and notes they minister to m
It’s been nearly a year since Young Life — a Colorado Springs-based Christian ministry that runs camps and youth groups around the world — announced the creation of a council in response to a viral movement that alleged organizational discrimination against LGBTQ people.
The council, Young Animation leaders said, would eavesdrop to the hundreds of stories pouring out on social media, stories of queer youth describing the rejection and heartbreak of learning they couldn’t be gay and also attend in leadership roles.
The management apologized to those damage during their time in Young Life, and pledged “a long process of review, reflection, repentance and reform.”
Last month, that council — whose members were never publicized — sent out a confidential document to top staff, clarifying for the first second in detail Young Life’s “sexual conduct policy.” The document, which was not publicly released but has been reviewed by The Denver Post, says “same-sex attracted, celibate people can be considered as candidates for staff and volunteer leadership.”
But the organization goes on to say that leaders “pursuing same-s
Young Life Under Pressure to Change Sexual Conduct Policy
A social media campaign started by two same-sex attracted former Young Existence staffers is putting pressure on the youth ministry to change its position on sexuality.
Kent Thomas and Christina Hofmann — two former Young Life staffers who are now openly gay — first shared their stories in July on social media.Thomas used the hashtag #DoBetterYoungLife, and others latched on to the idea.#DoBetterYoungLife has since become a social media campaign advocating for Fresh Life to alter its sexual actions policy for leaders, and to adopt LGBTQ relationships. This hashtag movement now has hundreds of stories via social media.
Young Life, founded in 1941, is one of the largest evangelical ministries in the country.Headquartered in Colorado Springs, it has chapters at nearly 9,000 schools in all 50 states, plus 90 countries.2018 revenue topped $400-million.
It doesn’t make staff policies public, but its sexual conduct policy (a copy obtained by James Madison University’s student sheet can be seen here) confines sexual activity to that within heterosexual marriage—just like virtually every evangelical church or ministry.
But Young L