Michael emailed me to see if I had read the times report/research I hadn't (been on holiday you know! ;) )... I have read the article now and spoke to one of the researchers at MIssion 21... I emailed him back with a stream of consciousness response - I am aware that there has been some discussion about the research especially over at Jonny's place but I haven't had time to catch up yet (only got home at lunchtime - 3 hours ago) so I am probably going over old ground for many of you!
I have some issues with the way the research was done and fear that it is trying to hard to challenge the Church... There is perhaps too much “Oh its OK Young People are really Spiritual you know...” used as an excuse. One of my fears is that we do not have a clear enough delineation between ‘spirituality’ and ‘religion’ in the way we talk about these things... The article does the research no justice in using the terms interchangeably, and not understanding the broadness of ‘spirituality’ - I think there is also a difference between being aware of a ‘sense’ of the spiritual, being a ‘spiritual seeker’ and having a belief system. I have argued with researchers before that the use of images is an inaccurate, maybe even unhelpful way of seeking response – it seems ridiculous to gauge anything from response to a painting like Dali’s – there is way too much tied up (or not) in an image, it seems way to subjective to start with to me! To say the following two things perhaps highlights flaws in (the) research?...
the data indicated that they found meaning and significance in the reality of everyday life, which the popular arts helped them to understand and imbibe
However, the authors also note the obvious contrast between the view of Generation Y that life is generally benign with the figures showing rises in eating disorders, substance abuse, teenage suicide, bullying and sexual abuse.
Also I found the following paragraph makes no sense…
Discussions about Buffy the Vampire Slayer failed to open out into talk about “alternative spiritual realities”... Even discussions about the September 11 attacks failed to elicit any mention of religion
…a discussion is a discussion and there are many factors that determine the direction of a conversation – not least the person ‘leading’ it... Secondly a discussion can have many levels – simply primary and secondary, and it may take time to mover from a primary level to another e.g. A Primary discussion on Buffy will not be about spirituality but will be about the characters or plotlines, spirituality may be several layers down! The same can be said about 9/11 the primary IME with young people is likely to be the political – leading on to Iraq etc. (So I don’t recognise the ‘Even’ in the sentence as pertinent)
I do agree with much that I have read of this report elsewhere .... But this, “The researchers were also shocked to discover little sense of sin or fear of death” does not hold with my experience at all... In fact 12 years of Youth Ministry show exactly the opposite... Especially in terms of fear of death! There is also much research to show the opposites – ultimately 180 teenagers is 180 teenagers and it seems to me, personally that we should place less emphasis on research and more on the empirical.
[Update] Steve Taylor has some good thoughts and comments - Sylvie one of the researchers comments...
We're not saying that young people aren't spiritual, and I'd agree with Steve that the type of spirituality we found in our sample fits with the quote from John Drane's book. We call this 'formative spirituality'. What we call 'transformative spirituality' (a more conscious attempt to foster mindfulness of the Other, howsoever conceived) is less evident.
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