We were blessed with a moment to sit down with Kenda Creasy Dean, who is one of the foremost researchers, authors and challengers of how our youth ministry is and needs to be. You can get more involved with Kenda’s work through the ministry of the Institute of Youth Ministry at Princeton Theological Seminary.
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goodbye Coe, you were my best friend
Yesterday I said goodbye to my long time friend, confidant, and traveling companion Coe, my black lab mutt for the last 15 years.
Back in ’97 my friend Darren went for a run in the country roads of Altamont area and came across a puppy in the woods that wanted to follow him. Darren kicked her & told her to go back wherever she came from, but she didn’t listen she just followed along. She made her way to camp where everyone fell in love with her. I tried not to mess with her because I knew what would happen. Well, it happened anyways. At the end of our weekend I had gone to get some flea & tick wash (bathing her in a wheelbarrow), fed her some food and had her riding shotgun with me back to Tuscaloosa.
I named her Coe (Co-ee) spelled after my friend Mike Coe, who had been murdered the prior year. Mike was a great friend to me & I wanted to remember him. Little did I know I was putting in his place my closest friend for the next half of my life.
On the way home to Tuscaloosa she threw-up (which was a trend she would keep up for a year or two of travels) looked at me with an “I’m sorry” look and continued on. She was Shawn & mine’s first dog (outside of dogs living with my parents). We had a fun time in Tuscaloosa teaching her to catch frisbee’s and sticks. She taught us how to un-stuff anything that was plush. She also showed up how to take the tops off of coke bottles, rather impressive.
Fast forward to today. Coe & I have been all over, camping, hikes, football road trips, epic east coast road trips, summer missions camps, getting lost many times, chasing many squirrels, 5 different homes, a few girlfriends, a courtship & marriage, a new child and many many friends of the 2 & 4 legged kind over the years. She has been with me through a whole lot of life.
In the last few years she began to develop tumors all through her body. We knew this day would come eventually because of our decision to not intervene in hopes of making it better, but chancing that an end could come sooner. She took a downturn over the past weekend. She was unable to get up the steps from outside (something she’d had trouble with for some time) but more than that she wasn’t eating much. She became really weak. We knew time was short & weep constantly this week. I gave her a bath Wednesday evening and placed her on a soft ‘crimson tide’ blanket my mom made for our two dogs a few years back. She passed away the next afternoon on the blanket.
It’s tough to as Brooks has taken to love Coe. He was pulling on the gate to the outside yesterday calling for her over and over again. She was laying passed away in the kitchen while I was in tears standing next to her. Today he was looking out the bedroom window that looks over the backyard calling for her. “She’s not there buddy..”
I’m having her cremated so that I can keep her with us. It’d be weird to keep her with us without doing the cremation process. I’m emotional, but not ready to go the weird guy spot yet. But, I’m going to miss my friend.
Coe, you were the best dog a young man could ever have. Thank you for sharing your life so generously with me.
Created a little Coe Richardson photo set that I’ll be adding some old photos to in the coming weeks & months.
We’re Not Young Anymore | Getting Real
I was teaching a youth ministry seminar a few weeks back where mentioned Shane Claiborne as an example for a point to make. Within the crowd there was a young couple from Brazil who had spent the last few years in an African country (cannot remember exactly) doing medical & teenager mission work. Being the awesome presenter that I am.. haha! I asked them directly, ‘do you know who I am talking about?’ There response was “No” so I started off describing Shane as a “middle aged white guy like me” & then when on from there. Connie, was in the group and jumped on me about saying he was middle aged. My thoughts in saying that were, he & I are about the same age (he’s a few more days than a year younger than me), me at 36 about to be 37. The life expectancy of an American born today is almost 79.. For my birth years it is around 72. So if the middle age of 72 is 36 then I am classifiable as “middle aged.”
This was most sobering when I turned 35 and said to my wife, “I’m halfway to 40, wow!” Her response was, “No stupid, you’re halfway to 70. You were halfway to 40 when you were 20.” Me.. “Crap!”
Missy Buchanan has a piece on the Boomers not wanting to ‘age’ according to the preset age’ism of the church, posted in Ministry Matters. I think this paragraph is spot on in the problem trending problem.
According to Hanson, a primary key to understanding boomers is to realize that they are keenly interested in staying young and are likely to resist anything associated with aging, old, or senior. Just consider our culture, which sends a strong message that aging well is all about remaining young, active and healthy. It’s not surprising that an invitation to join a group called the Amazing Grays would be met with little interest by boomers. In fact, boomers would likely consider such a group as something for their parents or slightly-older counterparts, but not for them. It’s not that they intend to snub their older peers, it’s just that they don’t see themselves in this role.
It is no joke that we are so stuck trying to be young in our culture. Youth culture is a prevailing market place. Billions of dollars are spent on ways to remain ‘young’ and it has been that way for as long as I can remember (thinking of you Oil of Olay commercials, sorry just Olay now). Adult parents are constantly trying to be “cool” (heck, adult youth leaders try to be “cool” all the time) and that is some mark of successful parenting. However, teen movies mock that trend, as teens many times do.
What is our problem with aging? The prospect of death that comes with aging? The idea that we might be our parents, whom we probably vowed never to be when we were younger?
Needless to say, as the church moves forward into the next decade plus it will need to figure out how to communicate to aging communities that doesn’t want to be older. Young adults probably don’t care for the monikers of “United Methodist Men / Women” (very established groups in my denominational tribe). The boomers probably don’t want to claim a “Young at Heart” (my local tribe). Millennials probably don’t want anything to do with our groups at all regardless of names.
Kenda Creasy Dean | State of Youth Ministry interview part 1
We were blessed with a moment to sit down with Kenda Creasy Dean, who is one of the foremost researchers, authors and challengers of how our youth ministry is and needs to be. You can get more involved with Kenda’s work through the ministry of the Institute of Youth Ministry at Princeton Theological Seminary.
Haunting Images of Tuscaloosa
I remember it really clearly. I woke up one morning at 5:30am for work and was there by 6am getting tennis courts ready when my sister called me freaking out “Are You OKAY?” “What’s the deal?” I asked back. “Are you not watching tv?”.. “No?.. I am at work.” “You need to turn on the tv.”
So I did..
My area of Alabama was on the national news as helicopters flew over areas of Tuscaloosa County all the way up to Birmingham. An F5 tornado dropped down in our area during the night. I knew we had a bad storm, but this?..
My buddy Darren came down from Nashville that weekend, Shannon came up from Auburn & we did what we knew to do. We went and volunteered however we could. This was when I had haunting images of tornados capacity embedded in my soul. We went out to an area and from as far as I could see to the left to as far as I could see to the right were wiped clean of any standing structures. No homes, trees down or stripped bare, foundation slabs, crap all over the ground.. People once lived here..
Today, I am unable to concentrate on other things as I am trying to comprehend what all happen to the place I called home for a great part of the decade of the 1990’s. So far, many of my friends still living in Tuscaloosa are accounted for. Still a few waiting to hear from.
As I can tell this tornado started somewhere close to downtown and then moved almost directly down 15th street where you had the likes of Central High School, the bowling alley, the mall, the golf course, and many eateries. Not to mention a huge assortment of apartment buildings & houses were scattered on or nearby 15th street. The tornado seemed to continue all the way up to Birmingham area (some 35-45 minute drive).
This guy probably regrets at the tail end of the video becoming an impromptu storm chaser. Gets way to close to a tornado than I’d ever like to be.
photos taken from Jason Clark Facebook album
As I know Red Cross is accepting donations via text for Alabama tornado relief. Text “REDCROSS” to 90999 for $10 donation.
NOTE: As I do have a youth worker contingent who is probably wanting to help, let me share words from my experience from our Nashville Flood almost one year ago. If you want to come help, just come and help. Don’t lean on people to do logistics for you as a short term mission camp does. Things are way to fluid & the people there have many pressing issues. Don’t try and schedule a mission trip out of this, this week or next. Wait until assessment groups can pull together and put in systems to be available for long term relief. Your hearts are in the right places, but in ways, the structural set up and needs of a youth community arriving (logistics of housing, a ‘what are we going to do’ etc.) on the scene are too much for people affected in the onset.