Generational Narcissism - A Few Brief Thoughts

Found this today. Thanks to Padraic Ingle for sharing it originally.

http://www.immersejournal.com/immerseblog/whats-your-theology-of-development/

A very good article. In my own ministry, I have certainly found this to be case. I preached last Sunday, not on the issue of narcissism, but particularly on the issue of entitlement. Perhaps they are two sides of the same coin. My assumption has been for many years that current teenagers/young adults did not start developing an undeserved sense of entitlement (or narcissism) on their own. It's not as if this started somewhere around 1990 out of the blue. They've been taught this behavior. I have found one of the best ways to combat these issues is not by whining about it, but by structuring ministry in such a way that it doesn't feed into the narcissistic/entitlement tendencies. You have to say, regularly, "This is not about you!" Most important, I believe, is that you don't build little kingdoms of young people. I was at a church a while back with absolutely wonderful space in their facilities for Youth. I'll admit, I was a bit jealous. The youth of that church had an entire wing to themselves! Who wouldn't want that? I'm not so sure it's healthy, though. I had the opportunity a few years ago to pursue building a new youth facility across the street from the church I currently serve. I rejected that proposal because I didn't think giving the youth that kind of separation would be healthy for their development. Instead, we ended up remodling space inside our main building. Our current Youth Room is fantastic, but it also requires our youth to be engaged with the rest of the congregation. Multi-generational ministry is critical. A healthy youth ministry will always bleed into a larger program of life-long formation. Young people grow into more responsible adults (and are more willing to take responsibility) when they are forced to interact with people older than them. As an interesting caveat to this, the current generation of millenials tend to get along really well with elderly folks. Is it because they have similar views on what it means to belong to something? To serve? To give? For whatever reason, mentoring possibilities are very rich when paring these two generations together.