422. The Situation of the Kids, 2001

Paul DeCelles gave this talk at a 2001 Teaching Review Seminar. He presented some of the results of the board of governors’ investigation of the situation of the high-school-aged youth in the People of Praise. He talked about the roles that purpose, friends, adults, social structure, the People of Praise and God himself play in the social lives of the kids.

Transcript

This document is a direct transcript of an audio recording, and may contain transcription errors and other minor edits for the sake of clarity.

[Editor’s note: In this talk, Paul frequently emphasizes “underlined” observations about the situation of the community’s teenaged children. He is referring to key phrases which were underlined in a typed manuscript of the talk handed out to audience members. For clarity and as a visual aid, these phrases have been underlined in this transcript.]

PAUL: So, let’s go on to what we think we learned, and—the board went through all this, and this is what we came up with.

So, I’m going to make some observations about the high school kids in the community. This is—I’m going to also—some of these things are underlined and they are, clearly, key ideas. Well, I will star them—[Paul makes a noise like a buzzer blaring], you know, “Touchdown!” or something—when we get to those lines. Okay?

Because of what we did at the High Country Adventure, there are many things we can say about the group as a whole, which is—that was one of the key ideas, underlined. That doesn’t mean, however, that there weren’t a lot of manifest differences between branches, and between the boys and girls.

For example, the girls from the Servant Branch, as I indicated before, felt that—they did feel trusted by their branch, and they felt like they had a place in their community meetings. The boys from Servant Branch, on the other hand—I’m just using this as an example; this is not something everybody should be all concerned about; these are examples to illustrate the point—on the other hand, experienced something different—they do experience something different—especially in regards to trust. They very strongly agreed with the statement, “The community doesn’t trust us.”

They ranked this statement higher than the boys from other branches did. It’s also clear from the

data that—and this is an important thing we want to build on—the community’s influence—let’s see, it’s also clear from the data that the community’s influence on their relationship with girls is much more of an issue for the boys from the larger—three larger branches.

Other differences between the small and the large branches surfaced in the data. Only 22% of the girls from smaller branches agreed strongly, or agreed, that they wanted more relationships with adults in the community. Is that clear? Only 22% from the smaller branches said that they agreed—strongly agreed or agreed—that they wanted more relationship with adults in the communities. That’s not a bad thing; the reason for that—well, it’ll be clear.

Many of these girls indicated, verbally, that their branches were like an extended family, and that they already had plenty of relationships with adults in their branches.

It was interesting to note that many girls from larger branches were wrestling, or had wrestled, at least to some degree, with the question of whether or not they wanted to join the community at some future date. This was on the girls’ minds.

It didn’t even seem to be an issue for the girls from the smaller branches. It was not on the girls’ minds in the smaller branches because of the family-like nature of their branches. They were moving on from their “family,” knowing that both their nuclear and extended family would always be there for them. The family-like nature of the small branches, therefore, seems to be a problem. Interesting.

In spite of the differences between branches, and between the boys and the girls, we saw several important things that transcended branch and gender boundaries. One message was loud and clear. The kids’—this is two underlined sentences here—the kids’ lives. . . . Let’s see, this. . . . 

Let me say this again: this is our opinion of what we saw; this is not what they said. So, by—so, this thing about—this situation with the kids is not—this is not a reflection of what the kids said. We heard what the kids said, and we also looked at everything else, and we analyzed the situation, and we’ve drawn our own conclusions about a lot of things. It’s not—so the fact [that] the kids didn’t say this is—doesn’t matter as far as we’re concerned.

The kids—so here it is: one message was loud and clear, I’d say, to any observer on the— walking [in] on the scene. The kids’ lives are purposeless and pointless. They lack real challenges.

Now, let me just digress for a bit. But you could say, “Well, if they perceive that their purpose is to do what they’re told and go to Trinity School and get good grades and to do their homework, and everything else, isn’t that a purpose?” And I’d say, “Well, I don’t—yes, it is. . . .”

I don’t want to fault them; I don’t want to say, “Don’t do that,” or anything like that—but that’s not what I’m talking about. They do not think. . . . Let’s see. In the instance I just cited, a reasonable kid, perfectly good, doing everything, could have the opinion that he’s doing it because he’s got to do it. “It’s not my purpose; it’s what these guys tell me I gotta do.”

So the question is, Does he have an aim?

We don’t do—this is another side remark; it totally is. Like, we don’t do career counseling, you know; a lot of kids come out of schools—out of our schools—not really knowing much, waiting to go to college to find out, after a year or so, what they hope to settle in. They’re not career-oriented, for the most part. I may be exaggerating there. But I think as a—we don’t have—that is to say, education has a purpose, and it is “to get me out the door,” and they agree with that purpose, but that’s not what I’m referring to. That’s not what we were talking about by “purpose” and “point to life.”

Okay. The only challenges the kids face, then, are at school: passing tests and turning in essays on time, and on the playing fields in—underlined—sports programs that are organized and run by adults.

There was one sense—one scene, rather—in a video which seemed to capture the purposelessness that permeated all their discussions and their videos. Three girls went for ice cream and spent 40 minutes chatting about nothing. We saw much of that 40 minutes on tape. They then went to Barnes and Noble, for want of anything better to do. In the front of the store, there are shelves of stationery, bookends, reading lamps, etc. They went from shelf to shelf, picking up trinkets, looking at them and commenting on them. One girl said, “Shouldn’t we be doing something more important than this?” Another responded, “Is there anything more important than this?” No doubt, it was a little negative humor, a little wry comment, but it—in fact, they know that they were getting at something there. It’s intriguing, the—one of the main characters in this had said, subsequently, “Well, if I had known what you wanted me to do, I would have done it,” you know. “But we thought we were just to go out and—you know, and just mess around. Show—take pictures of what we were doing.”

So, we heard and saw about—scene after scene of nice-looking, middle-class kids, in nice middle-class surroundings, doing nothing except hanging out together and goofing off. (That’s underlined also.)

It reminded us of the society [that early 19th-century British novelist] Jane Austen portrays, for those of you who’ve read Pride and Prejudice. In there, people gather together for two reasons: courtship and the card game whist. We saw in the videos the same sweet boredom Jane Austen describes, only what we saw was less genteel.

Among the kids, there seemed to be varying degrees of consciousness about the purposelessness of their lives. In the survey, the boys rejected the statement “purposeless/pointless.” Although they showed us the pointlessness of their lives, they weren’t conscious of saying that. They also rejected the statement, “Friends are important, but not for accomplishing external goals.” That was even—let me point out to you, I just mentioned a couple of the “themes.” The “themes” were pithy little sayings, eventually, but they were—everybody in the room knew what the saying meant.

They—did I already talk about this? They were paragraphs at least, in some cases essays, that this meant—this would mean. . . . If you voted for this, it would mean this, not this. “It would mean this.” “This is an example.” Et cetera, et cetera. So don’t think that it was just like, “Well, what would you think about if you were to fill out Some friends are important but not for accomplishing external goals. What would you say?” That was very definite; it had a lot of content, and they knew what it meant. But anyway, they rejected that statement. Even though, with one important exception, they never showed themselves doing anything purposeful with each other. The only purposeful activity they pursued with their friends was making music together. And not all of them were doing that, of course.

In one sense, then, the kids were very unconscious of the purposelessness of their lives. But in another sense, they were very much aware. The boys overwhelmingly confirmed that the statement, quote. . . . It was literally: quote, “Boring,” underlined, exclamation point, unquote [“Boring!”], okay? That stood for, “Everything is boring.” I mean, you could—there was a paragraph for that. This is—I’m just. . . . What it meant was, “I’m bored stiff.” 

It’s an interesting thing to turn that gerund into a different form of speech and say that that word “boring” pretty much describes their activity. They are really boring; they are boring themselves to death. [Paul chuckles.] Okay. But anyway, “boring” not only describes—I’m—by the way, I love the kids; they’re sweet, creative, beautiful, handsome. They’re all above average. [Laughter.] Okay? Don’t get the idea that there’s any—there’s no—there is no negative judgment about anybody in any of this. That is, I’m just trying to—this is our situation. And then. . . . So what can we do?

Okay? You must take me at my word at that. I really do—some of this may sound like, “Gee, boy, he’s really underestimating the kids,” or stuff like that. And I don’t. . . . I think the kids are capable—as you know—I mean, they’re filled with the Spirit of God, they have God’s very nature, they’re living the life of Christ. They just don’t have very many choices; they don’t know what they can do. They don’t have a sense of what they are, or what they can be, or what they can do.

Anyway, so: “boring.” The boys overwhelmingly confirmed this statement, “boring,” that not only describes how they see all community activities, but also describes all of their reality. They were saying that their lives are pointless. Using the word “boring” to describe their lives is, however, problematic, because it steers the boys toward a vacuous solution—and this is underlined: they think that the solution to their boredom is more and better parties and fun activities, as in a “winter beer fest.”

The girls, too, feel that way. They were partly aware of the pointless purposelessness of their lives. They hinted at it in statements like, “I want to make a difference.” That’s a quote. “I want to be challenged.” “I want to know I’m needed.” And we have—actually, there’s—we can decode these words, phrases, for you if you want to. . . . They don’t know that they have many options and they don’t realize that they are choosing “boring.”

Although they are only half-aware of the purposelessness of their lives, the kids have various ways of coping with this reality. Some kids act out in physics class, or at youth ministry, for example. They are saying, “This is pointless.” They’re right. There’s a certain sense in which physics class, or youth ministry, does not exist for the sake of making a significant impact on the world. They don’t see that it has anything to do with that. It’s a hurdle to have to get over to get on to the next class, next year.

Others—this is emphasized—others live in fear of losing their faith in college.

By the way, there are not a whole bunch of these underlined things, so when I say that they are underlined, they’re—we take them as being, like—what’s the word for it? You know, important. 

They know they are tumbleweeds, without the roots that purposefully—purposeful activity engenders. Maybe they have faith now, but they know that things could change; the wind could blow, and they would end up in a different place.

So they are afraid. I mean, they want to be Christians, and they are genuinely—some of them are genuinely afraid that they are going to lose their Christianity when they go to college, because they just—it’s like, “That’s what happens,” and they really don’t want that to happen.

Others cope with the purposelessness of their lives by trying to become reflective persons. They impute to their lives an importance it doesn’t have. In other words, they try to impose meaning on a pointless existence with their thoughts.

Sometimes—this sounds pretty tough, doesn’t it? Okay? But, you know, that’s what I get paid to do, right? [Laughter.] All right. Sometimes—okay, so they try to impose meaning on a pointless existence with their thoughts. They imagine, “This is—I declare: this is important. I am a reflective person.” So, sometimes, they find their faith a great prop in doing this. That’s a negative remark, okay?

These ways of coping with a pointless existence are ineffectual. A better way is to ask and answer the question, “So, what do you want to do about it?” In other words, “What purposeful action can you take?” Taking purposeful action—as opposed to rebelling, fearing, or thinking good thoughts—taking purposeful action, as opposed to rebelling, fearing, or thinking good thoughts—taking purposeful action is the solution to the problem.

It’s interesting to note that kids showed us a world in which God does not play a role. Now the world, their world, is a—he certainly plays a role in some individuals’ lives, but not in their life together. You could say they showed us a Godless world. That’s emphasized.

They don’t show themselves doing anything for one another. They weren’t talking about what they are going to do together for the Lord. We didn’t see them praying together. Their faith doesn’t seem to play a role at a corporate level.

The kids showed us something else in their videos, something they are much more conscious of. Someone filmed a Trinity Chamber Choir party, which was taking place in the school cafeteria. There were two TVs in the room, at opposite ends of the cafeteria. There was a group of people standing around each TV watching videos of the choir and their trip abroad. He [the person filming] panned his camera back and forth from one TV to the other, commenting, “Notice: kids here, adults there . . . kids . . . adults . . . kids . . . adults.” It was very clever. And it was true. There were no adults with the kids, and there were no kids with the adults. And it was a perfectly free—they had just come back from a joint project, and you would have expected them, somehow, to have meshed. Not all the adults that were in the video had gone on the project; they were the faculty members too.

On another video there was footage of a youth ministry small group. A group of girls were gathering in someone’s backyard. The camera panned over the group and then zoomed in on the two [adult] small-group leaders, who were standing apart from the girls, talking with each other. The cameraman commented, “Oh, look, they’re talking secret stuff.”

It makes sense that there is a chasm between adults and kids, because they aren’t engaged in a common enterprise. It’s very difficult for kids and adults to find something to talk about. As a result, adults in the community often ask kids the same questions every time they meet them: “What’s your name?” “What grade are you in?” And the kids resent that after a while. As one young, graduating senior told me—she’s rather on the shortish side of things—she said, “And then they pat me on the head.” [Paul chuckles. Groans heard in audience.]

Adults in the community are not doing something of importance—the adults in the community—okay, now, this is not underlined, but it’s a biggie. Adults in the community are not doing something of importance that the kids are an integral part of. If they were engaged in a common enterprise of serious purpose, they’d have plenty to talk about. “How much did you pay for the cups?” you know. “How much—what—how many people did you have to talk to to get to the point where you got the prescription filled for the per- . . . ?” Whatever the action might be, you know, there would be—the stuff of the life that was shared in the common projects would become grist for conversation.

In any case, the chasm exists. The kids clearly showed us that their parents are not a part of their world. They communicated to us that other adults, with the exception of their teachers, aren’t a part of their world, either. This fact, in our estimation, explains their ingratitude. It’s not that they are ungrateful people, per se; it’s just that in a certain sense, adults don’t exist for them. So it never occurs to them to be grateful. Even when adults are present, they are invisible. The kids just ignore them the way the kids ignore the kids—the way they ignore each other, unless they are friends.

For example, in one video scene a group of girls were in a car with the video camera on. They were taking pictures of the scenery, and recording their conversation on the way to school. A mother was driving them, but the girls never spoke to the woman, and the woman didn’t speak to them.

Have you been on trips with a—you know, like, maybe driving somewh- . . . ? I, one time recently, drove a van full of kids to an athletic contest and—it was a volleyball game—and I was absolutely flabbergasted. I was—I must have been part of the equipment as far as they—“This is an automatic car; you get in and it drives off.” [Paul chuckles and audience laughs.] It was quite someth- —and it was quite a long trip; it was about an hour each way! And I was just totally—I even—I tried to say a few things to get into—a conversation in, and that was rejected and, you know, they got on with real life. Okay. But I did, also—I didn’t have anything to say except, “What’s your name?” [Paul and all laugh.]

Okay. Just because adults are not a part of their lives, it doesn’t mean that the kids don’t want relationships with other adults—with adults. In fact, the girls clearly indicated that they do want relationships with adults.

The boys were unwilling to endorse a blanket criticism of adults. They gave very few points to the statement “Adults are not my friends. They judge and punish.” That was one of the themes. Also—that is to say, they say that is not their picture; they don’t think that that’s the way they are, as a group. And—and this is a conclusion: many of the kids do, as individuals, have relationships with adults, even though adults are not part of their corporate world. They seek them out and they have relationships that they find beneficial.

Not only did the kids tell us that adults aren’t part of their life together, they also showed us, in a variety of ways, that community events aren’t a part of their world, either. In their videos they showed us that the community is not actually a part of their world.

Nevertheless, the community looms large in their consciousness. In fact, at the High Country Adventure, we discovered that—this is emphasized—their whole world is essentially a world of opinions, feelings, and attitudes. The kids’ world is a world of opinions, feelings, and attitudes. Because they live in a world which consists of opinions, feelings and attitudes, they think Christianity has to do with opinions, feelings, and attitudes, especially feelings. They hear the call to Christ as a call to feel differently. It is very realistic on their part to say, “No.” They don’t want to feel differently. Others, who do want to feel differently, are disappointed because what really matters in Christianity is not that we feel differently.

When we asked them about real-life events, they could barely talk about them. They seemed incapable of thinking about the reality they showed us in the videos. They seemed almost totally unconscious of their actual lives, and—and this is underlined—the girls seemed to be even less conscious than the boys.

That was one of the reasons the video we put together to show on Sunday night for the girls was considerably shorter than that for the boys; it was about five, six minutes. The girls didn’t show us much. They didn’t seem to be conscious of much, either. I mean, it was not just that they were coy about the camera. Their inability—and so I’m using that not as proof, but as a demonstration—their inability to talk about their real-life situation points to the poverty of their existence together, of their corporate existence. All they have to talk about, besides their circle of friends, lies in the realm of opinions, feelings, and attitudes. It also points to—and this, we think, is a really important thing—it points to their sense of purpose—of powerlessness. Powerlessness. Why engage in a difficult task of looking at your life, if you know there is nothing you can do about it?

Understandably, the community looms large in the kids’ consciousness. That’s a big conclusion. It looms large as a society in which they don’t have a voice, and in which they don’t have a role other than being the object of people’s affections. The community looms large in their consciousness as—and this is emphasis, emphasized—an alien force. The community is—they’re aware of the community; this is their consciousness, their awareness of it—it’s an alien force which invades their lives and imposes its will on them, without talking to them or enlisting their cooperation.

It is, for example, the kids’ (at least the boys’) perception that the—and this was emphasized— the community forces their parents to control them. In particular, they know that their parents make them go to community meetings on account of community policy. They experience being forced to go to community meetings, but they have no place at community meetings. They experience being outsiders. After all, they really don’t have anything in common with us. In other words, they haven’t put anything in common.

Furthermore, the community doesn’t rely on kids or count on them for anything important. The community doesn’t give them anything to do that really matters, and the community doesn’t give them responsibilities.

Sum it up: we—and this is emphasized—we haven’t entrusted the kids with anything of real economic, political, or social importance. In short—and we emphasize this—the community doesn’t trust them, and they experience that distrust. Now individuals—of course, this is parenthetical—individuals may trust them, but the issue here is a corporate issue: “The community doesn’t trust us.”

It’s no wonder that they resent going to community meetings. They want to be needed, and they are not needed. They want to be entertained; the meetings are not entertaining. In fact, some of them experience being “shunned”—this is emphasized—some of them experience being “shunned” (that’s their word) at meetings. They say people turn away or look aside as they approach. And many of them are afraid—and this is deeply felt by them, underlined—they— many of them are afraid that their parents will be thought poorly of if they don’t go to community meetings. They’re really—we know, we have, I would say, quite firm evidence that they experience this kind of “multiple caste system” in the branches, the larger branches. 

There is another way in which the community looms large in the kids’ conscious- . . . . Are you having any fun yet? [Laughter.]

[Inaudible comment from audience.]

PAUL: [Paul chuckles, then responds:] Where’s my gun?

There’s another way in which the community looms large in the kids’ consciousness as an alien force bent on controlling their lives. The boys and girls want to spend time with each other and talk with each other, but they say—and this is emphasized—“The community tries to keep us apart.” The boys said, loudly and clearly, that the community interferes with their relationship with girls. The kids also said that we don’t trust them to behave rightly—righteously—with the opposite sex. So—emphasized—according to the kids, we think the worst of them and treat them like uncontrolled, emotional, bad people who are going to fornicate at the first available opportunity.

There is truth in what they are saying. Because of our dating policy, and our emphasis on the kids not pairing up, we, as a community, tend to be suspicious of even a boy and a girl talking innocently. Our dating policy creates problems, and the problems are magnified because it

is imposed upon the kids. They don’t—and it’s bec- —and the imposition of it: they don’t have an opportunity to embrace it freely, as an underway member does. The dating policy created problems at the High Country Adventure; it creates problems at Trinity; and it creates problems in the community. For example, because of the dating policy, no one wanted the kids pairing off at the High Country Adventure. But, that resulted in a very unnatural situation. They were at this camp together, but they had very little time to spend together.

At the evening sessions, they were actually—there were actually guards at the doors of the boys sessions, so that a boy wouldn’t sneak off and hook up with a girl. At Trinity, and at community events, because of the dating policy, the faculty/community members try to police boy/girl relationships; but again, this creates an unnatural and oppressive environment.

One boy told a story of walking into school with a girl he had carpooled with since he was—since they were three years old. A teacher saw them together and “broke it up.” A boy and a girl were talking after a public meeting. A community member saw them and “took care of that problem,” as he proudly told a coordinator.

If only—it only takes a few such incidents to create an oppressive atmosphere, but according to the kids, it actually happens all the time. The boys and girls do want to talk to one another without being—without Big Brother watching them. But at this point, we should note that the girls don’t want to do everything with the boys. Although on their evaluation forms, a fair number of boys suggested having the girls join them on hikes, the girls said clearly, in one evening session, that they didn’t want to hike with the boys.

Mary Frances [Sparrow] also asked the girls from Trinity at Greenlawn and River Ridge whether they liked having separate classes, and they indicated by a show of hands that they did. In fact, we saw in the videos and at the High Country Adventure that the girls from Meadow View, who hadn’t had the benefit of single-sex classes, were very insecure. We saw their insecurity in how they dressed, how they walked, and how they let the boys control everything at their party while they stood against the wall—against a wall—observing, etc.

There is one other very important thing we learned, and this is highlighted: Friends are everything. It was clear from the videos, and from the discussions, that what was important about school was the people. School provides a place for them to hang out with their friends. Similarly, the kids are grateful for the community, insofar as it has been a vehicle for them to meet their friends. For the kids, their circle of friends is the only place where they can make a difference. Their friends rely on each other for advice and for fun. They care about one another’s opinions. They notice when someone isn’t there. For the kids, their circle of friends is the only place where their presence really matters.

There is an underside to this, too—emphasized: Friends are everything because there is nothing else. The kids are not part of a society. They are not a social group. The community is a society that the kids know they aren’t a part of. It’s a mistake to say “and vice versa,” by the way. That is, it’s a mistake to say kids have a society adults are not a part of. That’s not true.

Because of the “kids here; adults there” phenomenon, it may look at first glance like they are a social entity. But they aren’t. That’s one of the things we learned at the High Country Adventure. That’s what the boys—that’s what the girls said to Mary Frances when they refused to vote on the statement “Trust is important to us.” They were saying—they meant to say—they were communicating this, clearly, throughout the time we were there: “There is no ‘us’ here.”

They understood that they weren’t a corporate entity. They understood correctly. We didn’t see or hear about any kind of social structure. The kids are not meeting together for any purpose. They don’t have recognized leaders. They don’t have ways to resolve conflict. They lack a voice in the community because they lack social organization.

The fact that they aren’t a society makes a certain amount of sense. You don’t need social organization just to hang out together. Society happens when there is more at stake in life than amusement.

Some of the kids at the High Country Adventure had clearly made decisions for Christ, for us. For those decisions—but those decisions were highly individualistic. Their choice affects their attitudes and interior dispositions. So—we emphasize this—their decision for Christ, those that have made one, puts them in a much better place psychologically, but it didn’t affect their social situation much. It didn’t—so that was emphasized—it didn’t affect the way they lived together as a group. In fact, sometimes, their good choice creates problems for them.

For example, at the High Country Adventure, there were a few “good” boys who disliked what people were saying at the evening sessions. Their way of coping was to check out of the group and say, in effect, “These simply are not my people.” They decided to have nothing to do with what was going on.

At this point it might be helpful to make explicit an important distinction that has been underlying all of our analysis here: that we don’t—that we have an infinite amount of time and we could go on forever. No, that’s not what it is.

Is it too dark in here? Are you all falling asleep yet? We probably should take a break at some point. Let’s see; let me see how much farther I have to go before we—oh. we’re just about—oh, my goodness, just a half a page till we can break.

So, at this point it might be helpful to make explicit an important distinction that’s been underlying this analysis. That is, the distinction between what is true of individuals and what is true of a group—of the group. Even if every kid at the High Country Adventure had been committed to the Lord personally, it still might have been the case that—underlined—their everyday social reality was a Godless one. Every kid probably does do something significant and purposeful individually, but that doesn’t mean that you can say, corporately, that they are purposeful.

Hence, our proposal, which you have already received, which is the matter which formed the basis of the consultation—about which we were consulted.

So, this is a good time to break, to end.

[Recording ends here.]

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