Category: Context

Why it might be good to ‘let children play’

On By JamesIn Context, Detached youthwork, Youth ministry, Youthwork, Youthwork Methods1 Comment

What was the happiest memory for you as a child? 

Or, if you’re a parent; What was something you loved to do, really loved to do, that you don’t let your own children do?

Was it out playing with your friends? Some of mine were kicking a ball around, scoring a goal, bmx’ing, wide games around the village until it was dark – but what about you?

Did you go on adventures?, play make believe, create stories, hide and seek?

I know when I stopped playing, it was when free play was sacrificed for ‘paid’ playing, and academic work at school took more focus, and even ‘fun’ stuff was in the supervision of adults, whether it was the church youth group, swimming club or scouts. Fun free play was reserved for Saturdays. 

Even looking back to my own experience I can notably remember how focussed and serious I had to become, (this was mostly a survival thing), fun felt frivolous, and achieving was more important. But I do know that I had a good few years of free play, in the parks, on bikes around the roads, and on other times I went on bike rides alone.

As a youth worker I would create ‘fun’ activities, like games that were meant to ‘help’ young people to learn something, like communication or team building, it was forced, it was cringe, and I felt uncomfortable doing it, it was if this kind of ‘fun’ in a scheduled supervised controlled way was what was expected of ‘Christian youth group’ - what did it do – create compliance, not creativity. It was ‘fun’ but almost like how adults have ‘fun’ , or how I had ‘learned’ to teach fun.

That world is gone, isn’t it.

Well, it isn’t quite. But maybe it has been gone for a while.

I noticed it when I was a detached youth worker in Perth from 2006 onwards, it was gone then. There was barely any children under 11 out kicking a ball around the parks, playing on swings or being in groups around. Yes, there were older ones in town, gathering to, well, gather at times, and because it was fun/dangerous/a place to drink – but the sight of young people, especially younger ones at a park was rare, and if it happened there would be a reaction that ‘they seemed young’ or ‘might there be a problem’ or ‘is there a risk that this child is out playing?’

I also noticed it as it was something that felt uncommon for my own kids to do, it was even more difficult when Nintendo DS’s were pleaded for and then purchased, CBBC programmes encouraged kids to play and ‘go outside’ and explore, on planes or adventures, yet held the attention of kids to ‘stay inside’

Yet in a fascinating way, being a detached youth worker also meant being in a space as an adult in which then loose supervision occurs, for if young people were desperate to be away from adults, for their own good and choice, then detached work could often send these young people to the more marginal hidden areas, or somewhere else. Yet, it was also par for the course that I would want to have ‘engagement’ with young people in this way, it might’ve been better not to be there at all, be even less visible.

Many more park benches were empty than they were full.

Even in more recent experiences, there was a growing reduction in young people accessing the ‘MUGA’s’ or imported football games that were in parks, even in the more ‘poorer’ areas where football was regular and common for endless months and weeks.

One of the things that has shrank in the last 20 years is the space for children to play, play unsupervised and unstructured, whether this is in the park, in schools, in youth clubs or in churches – completely across the board. Unstructured play is out, subscription adult supervised clubs are in. YES THIS IS NOT ROCKET SCIENCE, I AM STATING THE OBVIOUS.

And it has been lost at a cost. A serious one.

Play is good for children. I’ll rephrase this. Play is almost hard wired into every child. It’s as human an activity as the proverbial chimp baby exploring the wildness of the jungle floor. Play is creativity, play creates community, play encourages emotional and social development, not just physical, play is also good for brain development, play encourages learning and also attention… play is learning.

Imagine being a child growing up in a world in which your entire day, from 7am to 8pm is directed by nothing you want to do, but by what adults want you to do? How do you find meaning in this? in always doing what someone else finds important? If you aren’t given the opportunity to freely discover the moments of joy and happiness, or adrenaline or spark – then is it likely that you’re going to find meaning?

Might this be a reason why the early twenties/late teens of today are generation sensible? The Nintendo DS generation?

There is no difference between the glazed over face of the addicted gambler on the fruit machines of vegas to the Childs eyes on their electronic screens, and mine are the same too on the BBC sport live text feed, or something similar. It’s not just children, it is all of us.

However, once we realise this; What might it mean then, as educators, youth workers, parents even, to let ‘children play’?

Maybe there are more schools than I have experience of or research of that are encouraging ‘free play’ – so thats good , and groups like www.letgrow.org are pilotting free play time in the school days and evenings, with remarkable results. More at this article here

Play is something we grew out of as adults, but as adults we could now have the choice to help children grow back into, even if there are what feels a million pressures and voices fighting against the urge. The world is far far safer, and cleaner (thanks to unleaded petrol) than it was in the mid 1980s let alone the 1960s.

The book I am reading at the moment (Stolen Focus, Johann Hari, 2022) is not the first one to be reminding me of the need for play, but it is revealing to me the limiting and worrying effects on children by their lack of free play, such as imagination, creativity, attention and also becoming self masters and competent.

It often felt risky just to let young people have space to be. It was if they couldn’t be trusted. Yet it would be no surprise when they were asked ‘ what do you want to do this term?, was greeted with ‘nothing’.. young people organised and shepherded all their lives are going to struggle to believe that they can have a voice, an opinion about what they want , and have it believed. So why bother. It’s what they were used to.

The opposite of this is the example in ‘Poverty Safari’ where young people who do say ‘they want a place to go and chat’ have this place sanitised, commodified and evaluated for its soft skills and employability. (if the youth club is still open)

Im reminded in a bizarre way of the story of Dibs, in Dibs and the search for Self. In this treasure of a book, Dibs is ‘given’ all the toys in the world, but only strict/cold parenting, is locked in a basement, full of toys, and displays behaviour that reminiscent of a caged animal when at school, angry, lashing out, distracted, unfocussed. The account, written by Virginia Axline shows how a safe space to play, with no judgement, no paternal guidance, gave Dibs the opportunity to draw, create, play and show significant intelligences and awareness throughout. I wonder, and it may be a huge leap – but this story showed how much both parents and children needed to be supported to understand how to love and communicate. I wonder, 60 odd years later, what it might mean for instead of being locked and trapped in rooms with toys, the forces that dictate and shape ‘play’ and ‘parenting’ are the tech companies, whose prime motivation is maintaining attention (and making money from such attention).

One American study found a diminishing locus of control among children, meaning they increasingly feel their lives are being determined by others.

Rutger Bregman, Humankind, 2020

You can’t teach creativity, you have to let it blossom

Peter Grey, 2013 (The Play Deficit)

The flaws in the world, in regard to giving children time and the opportunity to play are largely those we have created and permitted to be created. Children and Young people have needs, they also have gifts too. It is our job as parents, as educators to create environment where these needs can be met, and their tiny steps of creativity can be fertilised, and blossomed.

There might be a reason why ‘the box’ more than the toy inside the box is more fun for a child, that box has open space and creativity, it could be a hiding place, a den or a fort, it could have wheels, it could house teddy bears. Trust me, I used to hate this, when as parent id spent £xx on a toy, and had expectations of how it was about to bring joy, it did, eventually, maybe in mid January, but the box captivated in the immediate.

The very creativity that a child hasn’t been able to develop, might be the very thing the next generation needs.

If Depression is the number one disease (according to WHO) – then our biggest shortfall isn’t in our bank account, or budget sheet, but inside ourselves. It’s a shortage of what makes life meaningful. A shortage of play. (Bregman)

Children learn best when left to their own devices, what could we do in 2024 to push for more play spaces, to push against the tide of the dominance of the screen on play time. What might you and I do as adults to embrace play in our own lives? That free play once again?

What might we (youth workers, family workers, community workers, parents, teachers) do to provide where possible ‘free’ play space, trusting it and giving children and young people this valuable space? What might this look like, and the benefit of this be into 2024..?

References

Stolen Focus, Johan Hari, 2022

Humankind, Rutger Bregman, 2020

Dibs in search of self, Axline 1964

Poverty Safari, Darren McGarvey, 2017

Play based learning can set your child up for success

The importance of play

5 tips for Detached Youthwork, from Street Photography.

On By JamesIn Context, Detached youthwork, Youthwork2 Comments

Over the last few months ive been intentionally out and back on the streets again.

But not as a detached youth worker, instead going out with a camera and learning, slowly the art of street photography.

And I love it.

I love the interaction with people. I love the sense of the in between space. The context. I love what it brings out in me.

I love observing.

I love also how its given me a new way of seeing the world – or should I say, its given me an avenue to develop what I loved so much about doing detached youthwork.

I want to share with you a few themes that are beginning to emerge for me, some of the lessons im learning at the moment, which might be useful for you if you’re out doing street based youthwork.

  • Know your Intention

With a Camera, I have to be sure of why I am there. It would sinister to try and hide what I am doing, it would arouse suspicion. I may be able to say this in a few ways, and I am genuine with folks when I say I am learning, trying new skills. I have had people already ask me if im surveying for film locations..

You are going to be asked why you are there. Whether a street photographer or detached youthorker.

Be confident in what you are doing. If you’re not confident, then ask why.

I liked this video by George Holden explaining this, you might like it too.

For detached youthwork.. know why you are there, and ensure that all of your team are there for the same reason. Its important…

  • Smile and be light

Especially when there’s any confrontation. For me, there is no photo in the world that I could take thats more important than damaging someone else’s day by taking a photo that they didn’t want me to do so. It’s important to be a good human. To look as though I am enjoying myself, smiling and having fun. Im one of the performers on the street as the stage. Today I was asked by some security guards about my photos, they have every right to ask, they are doing their role in the streets too.

Also, Smile and give feedback, ive told people that they make a nice photo, and thank them. Most people so far enjoy this.

I can look back and realise quite how much I wasn’t in a smiling place during much of my detached work…. it was a job, it was a profession, it meant a lot to me, and it was an escape.. not the best I know.. Im so enjoying smiling and interacting with people in this way.

  • Mindfulness.

Yup. I have noticed that when I make judgements of situations with a camera I am less ‘in the moment’ to take a photo – my mind has made up stories of situations. A classic example was a few weeks ago, there was a black gospel choir singing – and a white man preaching in Newcastle. My mind had gone to all sort of places in terms of making judgements on this in terms of power and race. Some or none might be valid, but all took me away from my actual intention, and away from being present.

The street, and people are what they are. It is a place full of colour, activity, noise, drama, unpredictability, and none of it needs to be judged, it can be enjoyed.

Im reminded of how easy it was to ‘make up stories’ about groups of young people on the streets – what they might be doing, activities, previous experiences, and not be able to stay in the present, in the moment. Mindfulness. The present is the important place. Thats where the interaction happens.

  • Bursts may be better than Exhaustion.

Ive found that I can walk and take photos for hours without realising it, I used to walk the streets around a city doing detached youthwork for 2-3 hours without a break. What im finding is that im more concentrated and present in shorter bursts, so grabbing a coffee or a break helps. Often in a city I seem to naturally find a space away from people for a while, today I found Manors railway station and took some photos there for a while, a few weeks ago in Whitby I walked down the harbour, away from the crowds for an hour. Leaving to come back can give fresh eyes. refocus the mind.

  • The Context plays a Part.

Today I practiced taking photos with the context in the frame. A lamppost, bin, bollard, edge of building, railing, as part of the frame and photo, giving the context a part in the photo. I talked about context a lot previously – do look up those pieces on the categories tab. The day of the Kings coronation brought some crowds to Newcastle , on a bank holiday the tourist were in force in Whitby… these all shape the context – and the streets, city, suburb, rural all have a different effect on communities of young people.

Just a short piece, on What im learning from the Streets… as a street photographer, and how this might be useful in detached youthwork too. There is probably a few more other things too.

Change starts with ourselves.

On By JamesIn Context, Youth ministry, Youthwork, Youthwork MethodsLeave a comment

I make no apology for not writing as much on here recently, as what I have written about a lot of has been about my inner experiences, self discovery and learning, and whilst in the past I have written about some more personal things on this blog in the past, ive put all of this on my other blog which is linked here. The latest over there is about the futility of trying to be good..in order to be liked. This applies to youth/community work practice, as much as it does just being human.

It made me realise that there is such a crossover between what Ive learned for ‘myself’ and how it applies in practice, that I should write more here on some of the same topics.

So here goes.

Do you remember the old joke, the one about youth/community workers and changing the lightbulb?

How many does it take?

100.

1 to change the bulb, and 99 to sit around writing articles on coping in the darkness.

Its best to sit in the crowds isn’t it. And be the 99.

Powerless to make anything happen, and just write.

Passive, and hoping that words alone, submitting in a peer review, or a blog might make a difference.

I realised that it didnt. I realised that I got stuck.

Oh look how self congratulatory this sounds. Look at me.

its far far messier than this, I promise you.

I was stuck. Trapped. Addicted even.

And I so so loved writing words into the darkness, here or on social media. Keep the swirl alive by adding fuel to it, cynicism, sarcasm, irony and the rest. Satire being the tool of the powerless, and I lapped this up, Friday nights ‘The Last Leg’ was on repeat.

All the time positioning myself as the helpless victim, to identify with the young people, or communities I ‘served’. Feeling trapped too in a damaging relationship in which at one point I felt I had no options.

Though I did start to notice something.

I had a disastrous experience completing an MA in Durham, which I basically completed in the midst of emotional trauma, in a shell like capacity – only survival instinct keeping me going. Yet during that time my tutor Pete Ward looked me in the eye and suggested that ‘ You’re not thinking that a youth worker is also a victim are you’. When I think I was writing about youthworkers and their managers..or lack of. I didnt have the emotional capacity or tools to be able to respond to Pete then. It was the first time this thought clicked in me….

But what did this mean – to ‘not’ be a victim.

Fast forward a few years, and I am delivering ‘Young Peoples Challenging Behaviour’ training to my good friends Dave and Jen Johnson in Byker , Newcastle. They are true heroes and I love them. I regularly showed up at their churches and did some training for them, sometimes utterly beknownst to them, masking some pretty horrid stuff. But I realised, and I know it sounds obvious now, that ‘we’ as youth/community workers need to look in own mirror at young peoples challenging behaviour, yes it might be as a result of a young persons trauma, but it can be triggered by our own woundedness, our own competence, or something we are doing, consciously or unconsciously.

At the same time as delivering this training. I had started Therapy. I was also reading books about manipulative behaviour, and its patterns. Many of the books said the following, echoed by the group of supportive friends I had at the time.

Only you can change, and cause those around you to change their behaviour. (or for it to be revealed)

In a youth work setting its too easy a get out of jail card to play, stating that the challenging behaviour by young people will change when they change.

the same is true for organisations and churches too.

As a youth worker I would have loved it if my local churches took youthwork seriously, funded it correctly and gave it good management. But what then? and… what was I actually doing about it at the time to encourage that to happen? This isn’t to blame myself looking back.

Blaming others, or waiting for others to change alleviates me to take any responsibility.

Responsibility that I could take to change my actions and behaviour.

Which ultimately is all I have power over to control.

Ive write about the Victim triangle before, but there’s also the Adlerian Triangle.

There is always a choice. And we have a lot more power than we think.. And it is allowed to be used, thats what I needed to learn and discover for myself. The situation can change.. but only if I change myself – and not wait for others to change.

The situation was unlikely to change if I wallow in my self pity (Poor Me)

Or blame the system, the church, the young people, their parents, education systems, anything… (The ‘bad’ guy)

I, instead had to made changes about my behaviour myself.

And it meant digging deep.

Now I get that its not always possible, if the situation hasn’t changed and you’ve ran out of options, a choice might to ‘get out’, to erect boundaries – but these are also behavioural changes you are making, for your own good, and thats a good thing, trust me. but…

Let me give you an example.

I often hear a version of the following.

Sometimes, there just doesn’t go a day when there isn’t a text or message from a (parishioner/church sub group/young person/colleague) interrupting my evening at 9pm, its non stop, and this happens on my day off too.

What might be responses to this scenario – and can you see how the ‘poor me’ / ‘the bad guy’ thing is playing out here?

The additional problem here is that of the person sharing this might actually be enjoying that they are feeling needed, valued and important at 9pm on those evenings, thats another aspect too. It may be that this attention is secretly liked, which is why its not changed, just publicly complained about. ‘look at me being available but pretending to complain’

But how could this be changed? if the person actually wanted to change.. Just change behaviour. The action of switching off the work/mobile phone at 8pm, is going to stop the messages, as it muting the chat or not responding at first. It does sound simple, in a way.

The person sending the text, soon realises that they didnt get a response, or only a ‘grey tick’ – next day at the church meeting their feelings will often be revealed… ‘I notice you didnt get my message’ or ‘ it seemed odd to me that you didnt respond when I wanted you too’.

See how the other person has to change, and/or reveals their response to the change. It is by acting that change happens.

But its amazing that when you see this pattern, its hard not to notice it in many places.

Especially when waiting for someone or something else to change… a change that will seemingly result in my betterment, ease, well being or happiness. Sadly thats not life golden ticket.

Ive sat so often in organisations and churches in which there is a deep desire to change (yes honestly), but the desire is that someone elses responsibility to the changing.

If only the congregation would change.

If only the minister would change

If only the youth worker would change

If only society would change (back to the 1960’s).

If only….

And if they did… would it make any one actually happy?

It may be crude but individuals expecting other people to change without doing anything themselves, is like the spouse of an addict waiting for the addict to change without realising their emotional crutch on something out of their control. This is Co-dependency.

I get that this might be crude, but for some belonging and identifying with a faith group or organisation can have addictive qualities, given the deep roots and sense of emotional connection. Addicted to Jesus, thats what Carman sang back in the early 1990’s and evangelical youth ministry kids like me lapped this up. So I get it. Being Obsessed by God was the cry of Delirious 10 years later.

Read Co-dependent No more by Melody Beattie to reflect on the codependent dynamic, of the ‘poor me/victim/ waiting for their addict to change.

I guess ive laboured the point now.

But I realised that only I could change. I had to. There were phone calls I made that made me vulnerable, there was power within me that I had to access, there was breaking I needed to do, and I could change. Just me, myself. And, it was hard work, very hard work.

I had to see myself different, love and value myself (at all), and become more aware.. and its been and continues to be a long long rewarding path, of self improvement, self love and compassion.

Even if it upsets people. Yes. Even if it upsets people. Its likely too, because it means that they have to change too. Our lesser availability might encourage self – reliance, in the phone call example above. Our non tolerance of something destructive might reveal behaviour.

This isn’t about changing to be demonstrative or destructive, just for clarification. It was about realising that real change starts from ourselves.

I realised, only I could change myself… and then expect others to change around me. It was all I had the power to change, and to be honest.. that in itself after many years of learned codependent behaviour from trauma.. was hard enough.

Thank you for reading, I may write a few more pieces on this blog in the next few weeks, a cross over of learning from self help into youth work and community work, do leave a comment or like below, id love your feedback on this kind of thing.

Safe Spaces..are Safe for whom?

On By JamesIn Context, Detached youthworkLeave a comment

Can I be honest with you about something please?

Actually really honest, honest about something that I think we need to think about a bit.

That’s ‘We’ in the youth and community work ‘world’ and also ‘we’ in the what seems to be ‘post’ pandemic narrative about churches and community spaces.

I want to have a conversation about ‘Safe Spaces’.

Not warm spaces, warmer hubs or prayer spaces. Safe Spaces.

Can we have a chat about this please?

Its a space. Yes. Its a hall, a room, a church, an area.

It could be a ‘zoom’ room, or teams gathering too.

So, that’s ok then. Space is fine.

It’s the ‘Safe’ thing.

Who exactly is this space.. safe for?

and.. Who gets to decide that it is a safe space?

Sometimes I’m in a training setting and the leader will say ‘This is a Safe place’ – but im thinking, I dont actually know any of the other 100 people in the ‘zoom’ room. What makes it safe.. what makes it actually safe..for me? Is it safe that I dont know what question is going to be asked? Or what im about to encounter?

Over 12 years ago when I was a street based youth worker in Perth Scotland, one of the pieces of feedback from the young people whom we as a team encountered on the streets was that ‘because of you the streets feel safe’. In that instance being present, being trusted, being known and identified as a supportive adult, meant that for the young people they identified safety. This surprised me, for usually on detached work.

It wasn’t that we as a project claimed safety, the young people felt it.

If I say the space is safe…. what might this mean if actually it doesn’t feel safe for the participant… where might they go or talk to if they want to describe the alternative? What is it that I might be claiming? And should I be?

Does safe mean – physically safe – the health and safety check

Does safe mean – physically safe – No one can enter who the other young people have been bullied by (so is this space now exclusive?)

Does safe mean – Spiritually safe – the young person isn’t going to be ‘encouraged/manipulated’ into believing something, just because they got free snacks?

Does safe mean – safe to express contentious views?

Does safe mean – avoidance of risk?

Does safe mean – all the policies, including safeguarding are up to date?

Does safe mean – just not ‘unsafe’? In which case, its a bit redundant..

Who decides the safe thing though?

More to the point, who should be the ones deciding, or claiming that a place is safe?

If a homeless group of young people attended your evening drop in once, would they say it was safe? This could take months and years for them to make this assessment, because they trust the people and what is on offer, it regularity and they respect they receive in that space.

Claiming safety because of training, policies, comparison to other places – could silence those who want to have experience difficult behaviour within it.

As someone who has experienced emotional abuse, acknowledging the need for safety is important. I know where and when I have felt safe. The last place I would go to ‘feel’ safe is somewhere that claimed it and I had no evidence for it.

It goes back to power. Who has the power to determine what is, or isn’t safe. Abusive people hide behind as many courses and programmes and religious institutions to validate themselves and claim safety, yet those who have been abused by them.. have no where to go…. Survivors of abuse can often detect unsafe people a mile off.

‘Safe’ shouldn’t be banded around as if its the new ticket for community or healthy or educational spaces, all of which could be amazing and good, and informative and challenging and inspiring.

If there even needs to be an alternative. What about Brave?

Yes. Brave.

Brave spaces not safe spaces.

Because, we, you and I are all brave in creating this space, you are brave for attending it and participating, or volunteering in it – we are all brave together. Maybe you are brave for reading this?

Brave to make the space as welcoming and hospitable as possible

Brave to accept people for who they are

Brave to let there be vulnerability

Brave to try things, try new things.

Brave to be challenged, brave to say yes or No

Brave to accept failings, brave to acknowledge gifts, brave to see everyones humanity in the space.

Brave to accept emotions, brave to disagree, brave to have conflict that gets resolved, brave to be quiet, brave to make noise.

Brave to share pain and ‘the real’ , brave to feel happy, light and free.

Brave to belong.

Brave means ‘we’ we are brave together. , Safe potentially means ‘I’ and ‘You’ because both I and might feel different about safe.

Can you see why ‘Safe’ could be a problem word? Lets not throw out the good intentions of being safe, safer for and with our communities, absolutely not. I just wonder whether ‘safe’ has become not only over used, but also something that needs to be very carefully thought about in its use.

I do want to thank Jen Johnson for inspiring me on this post, as she and her husband Dave inspire me always as they live, reflect and create community in Byker, Newcastle. It was her FB post on this that gave me an alternative language to ‘safe’.

I found this article really helpful too: From Safe spaces to Brave Spaces

What’s interesting about this.

Is that People make Spaces Brave.

The Space is only Brave because you make it so.

That makes you, I and everyone, part of this together.

Brave people, create Brave Spaces.

I’ve changed my mind about empowerment, here’s why

On By JamesIn Context, YouthworkLeave a comment

Can we have a conversation about empowerment please?

Because, well I thought I knew what empowerment was. And I did, I knew what empowerment was.

In Theory.

But what I didnt know was what empowerment actually was. Until I felt it. Until I experienced it.

Cutting aside the conversation of the theory of empowerment and the word itself for a moment. Yes its all about power.

Can I get to the gist of it?

Can I be completely honest with you for a moment – please bear with me.

Ive got to admit a few things.

One of them

Is that even if I thought or said otherwise there’s a part of me that wanted to have some credit for helping a young person.

Or.. I wanted it to be that ‘my faith in Jesus, and Jesus’ actions through me’ helped the young person in the Youth work practice.

And… secretly I wanted the young person to give me some credit for this.

I wanted to be the person who met the young person in the midst of the mess and helped them up – and maybe unknowingly wanted them to be dependent on me, or give me credit for being there ‘to fix them’

Was that ever empowerment?

Some of it was in the name of ‘developing a purposeful relationship’ with the young person – meet them at a point of need, then hope that in the long term in the conversation there is some ‘faith’ conversation… after all this was the purpose wasn’t it?

So that the young person could look back on me as some kind of hero, or helping support at the very least.

Now, being kind on myself, funding applications that kept me in a job also encouraged this.

Wanting me to justify how ‘Youthwork provision’ changed and transformed young people – creating better outcomes, enabling some kind of change. Which is great, but the tendency to want to find the story, and also find the quotations from young people to say that the project, the organisation could take some credit for it.

What does this do to the young person? If they truly did ‘change’ in any way – what does this do to their sense of esteem, sense of purpose, and their own development.

Does it enable them to see their own strength that brought about change or to only see themselves as being rescued (or somewhere in between)

Up until 2019, I had barely given any thought to my own ’empowerment’ journey. I was a survivor, strong exterior, able to cope with anything. My own youth work experience as a young person was littered with structured organised groups like scouts and swimming club, and yet I had received significant support from an older couple who were my church youth group leaders.

Empowerment wasn’t a word I knew. I was on the run. Afraid. If you’ve read my other blogs you will know that my childhood was full of significant emotional abuse, that was impossible to articulate, but I was in the midst of. And I can say now that I was a bundle of raw emptiness that was searching for belonging, and found it in my local church.

And this is largely where I stayed, in the midst of the church community in a variety of forms, people pleasing to appease my parents, staying in the ‘fold’ , doing further study for my own sake (but also to make them proud) .

I was a mess. A bundle of emotional mess, and it was about to fall apart.

What I didnt know is that I was about to go on my own empowerment journey.

Firstly I had to be vulnerable. And at times I still know this is the best way. Thanks Brene Brown.

I had to ask for help – after trying to be the strong one. The alternative was homelessness. Asking for help, meant asking a friend if I could stay at their house.

I was in need of the basics. Safety, Food, Water, Sleep. Maslows bottom rung of the pyramid.

My friend gave me my own room, I had to go and buy new bed sheets, duvet, pillows and a towel. (again if you have read my other blog you will know why I couldn’t go and knock the door at my parents)

I needed. I was at a very low point and I had to be vulnerable.

I had reconciled to myself that I was going to learn what I needed to learn from the experience, and that I was going to have to face realities of suffering, and not avoid them.

After a short while I gathered people around me, a support group if you will. I remember many times asking these people ‘what should I do’ – and trying to work out what was going on.

At first it annoyed me that they would say ‘its your decision’ or ‘I’m not going to advise you – you have to decide what you are going to do’

It annoyed me because I didnt want to take responsibility, I didnt feel I was capable of making decisions, big or small. But I soon got it. Or at least expected the response.

I had to make decisions. I had to do things for myself. One way or another. I was being empowered, and my friends stuck by me if if they didnt always agree with the decision I had made. Which felt a little strange at the time I admit.

It meant that I, now, a few years later, can look back years, weeks and months and know something about what empowerment is.

Yes I needed a short term sticking plaster – my immediate needs were shot. I had barely nothing. On the first night I arrived my friend took me out for a meal at the pub. Honestly I felt like a warm blanket was being wrapped around me. I was safe.

But gradually, month by month, I began to grow. From the darkest deepest point. I didnt want to feel indebted, but I deeply appreciated and was grateful.

Amongst many things I learned what empowerment truly is. Or at least, I had now received the experience of the kind of support that enabled me to see that I had to make decisions and choices and make the decisions about what kind of life, what kind of person , what kind of future I wanted.. miniscule step by step.

Empowerment wasn’t about advice giving. It wasn’t about being rescued.

It was about being safe, feeling heard, listened to and loved.

It was about being given the tools to slowly fly.

It wasn’t about swapping one type of dependency, with another.

It was something that enabled me to make steps foward, one by one, one emotional, physical, spiritual, mental step at a time.

Empowerment, like Darren McGarvey says in the end of Poverty Safari, enabled me to take appropriate responsibility for myself, and not play victim to circumstance.

Empowerment even from the midst of nothing was to be able for me to grasp the something. Not necessarily to be given it easy on a plate. Actually I didnt want easy. Easy was avoidance.

Empowerment for me also meant dignity. I may have needed and appreciated being looked after, but I also wanted to discover how I could look after myself with the newly discovered resources.

I get how a conversation about responding to poverty and peoples needs needs to look upstream to the causes, instead of just providing a sticking plaster, churches getting tired with always responding. But, even for the individuals being helped? is it a small step to empowering someone, or maintaining a dependency?

Not for the first time in the last few years, ive had to reconsider what I thought I knew because I ended up up having to experiencer it for myself. God its painful when that happens, but that pain is so worth it. What does empowerment mean to you? What might it mean for your practice of serving? What might it mean as you give a food bank package, or welcome someone in a warm space?

There are causes to poverty and they can be challenged. There is helping people and that is needed. But what does it truly mean to empower people out of the poverty they find themselves in… so that they know that they, like I can know that they were able to do it and realise it themselves?

Listening is Loving

On By JamesIn Context, Detached youthwork, Youthwork2 Comments

Back in the Mid Nineties, and it might even still be kicking around somewhere in the annals of basic youth ministry training mythology, there was a phrase that went like this:

Q:How do you spell Love?

A: T-I-M-E

The thought being at the time that ‘giving young people’ – giving anyone time was a way to ‘love’ them. What this seemed to say was that ‘by putting on’ a youth group, an activity for young people, and giving them time in your day, making time for them in the church schedules, creating time for them to be part of Sunday services – was a way to indicate that the young person, and as a group were loved.

In those, and every day, Young people have a high value on authenticity. Giving them ‘Time’ was a way to do this – or so it was meant to indicate.

Problem is that time was often about getting young people to be part of ‘doing what we (adults/the church) want them to do for us. It was a transactional relationship – we’ll give you time, if you do what we want – this is us showing that we love you. It was a transactional relationship in which young people in their masses have checked out the store and aren’t bothering to go back to, not even to claim a refund.

Maybe because Time wasn’t love after all.

Not in that way.

What if Listening is loving?

In Hector and the Search for Happiness, Hector recognises that Listening is Loving. Its key for happiness. Being listened to.

Listening is one of the core features of developing detached youthwortk on the streets and I public spaces. I would normally advocate for a good few weeks and months of sending out into the area teams of people to listen to the real sense of what is going on. Because listening occurs in a number of ways – before even conversations with young pope require listening to.

Listen to the Context – the sounds, the patterns, the behaviours, the interactions, the languages, the modes of speaking

Listen to the Context – what are its key messages to you – what’s the fight all about, whats getting people angry, upset, – whats the theme of the graffiti – who is writing it, whats noise is there at different times of the day, whats the chat about at bus stops, metro stops, buses or in the queues at the shops.

Listen to Ourselves – how are we making observations, can we accept and not make judgements? – what feelings to I have, do I acknowledge – what prejudices might I have, what favouritism might I have – what voices do I hear loudest – which are lessened?

It’s as if the precursor to community based work is listening…

But what kind of listening? It seems like listening has become the reaction to getting things wrong. Boris promises to ‘listen’ more after making a mistake – but how and how would have this been measured? Promising to listen, seems a political thing.

Of course tokenistic listening isn’t loving at all is it? Listening to only hear what we want for our means, seems like opportunist and strategic, and when I am only listening like this I miss the spaces in between..what isn’t being said

What if I’m listening to my children when they returned home from school a few years ago, and all I actually heard from them were the words ‘headmaster’ ‘trouble’ and ‘£10’, I was listening, but was also preparing food..what might I infer from the key words I heard? How might I react? Would I think they got into trouble stealing £10 and were sent to the headteacher? What if they were telling me their friend got into trouble? Or what if the headteacher said ‘if it’s no trouble can everyone pay £10 for the school trip?

Was I listening? Or was I listening and not being fully present? Was I listening and taking just the words I wanted to hear and trying to make conclusions from limited information? What ,maybe who, was more important, the task I was doing for them, or listening to them in the space?

Can listening in community work feel like the same? Listening for the important words so that we, organisations and charities and churches can fly into appropriate action? Is that love? Was it even listening?

If we’re interested in listening as loving, what kind of listening might that require? On a personal level, I didn’t know how to speak about difficulties in life…

Until I felt safe. A safe person, a safe relationship, safe. But even then it took time, alot of time. Listening so that I could act and change my reality. Not to have it done for me. But safety was what I needed.

Listening involves time. Listening involves patience

Listening involves listening to the gaps

Listening involves an open space for someone to talk, not a space to mine the information.

Listening involves ourselves…being willing and attentive

Listening involves noticing the emotions behind the words

Listening involves not interrupting

Listening

Is anyone listening?

Are we as good at listening as we might say we are?

Am I?

What does it take to be present to the person who is speaking to me?

What listening might be required?

What does it feel like to be listened to yourself?

Have you felt this? Have you?

What might it take to pass this on?

When I am anxious, I’m not listening, when Im afraid of silence, Im not listening, when Im trying to make something happen, and fear having too open a space in a one to one session with a young person – or in a supervisory context- am I listening? When the system, or the church, or the organisation is crumbling… is listening possible? What might the effects of not listening be? Usually assumptions, judgements, projections and quick fixes.

Listening is loving.

Non listening is something different.

I think the process of healing begins when we open our hearts and listen empathetically.

We can help people not because we know the solutions to their problems

but because we care enough to stay and lend our ears.

knowing that others have gone through similar difficulties

they become better equipped to cope with theirs

Haemin Sunim (Love for Imperfect things)

Might accessible church be good for all?

On By JamesIn Context, Discipleship, Mission, Youth ministryLeave a comment

I was at a workshop today, in which the following list was created, can you guess what it was about?

  • Keep in Simple
  • Use multi sensory activities
  • Form a good relationship – connect
  • Make sure the length isn’t too long
  • Value quality over quantity
  • Ensure inclusivity
  • Share Gods love
  • Keep things familiar
  • Make it about heart and not just head knowledge
  • Value ceremony and sacred
  • Dont patronise
  • Give roles so that they are involved
  • Appreciate the interruptions, it might be Gods voice
  • Value understanding and listening
  • Have a clear structure
  • Create opportunities for serving and using gifts
  • In the Socialisation after ask open questions

and to make it easier for you..this one…

  • Ask the folks about hymns and subjects that they like

What do you think?

What might be this list about?

And maybe…what kind of workshop did I go on today?

Yes that’s right, you guessed it.

I went on a workshop about how to make church services accessible to young people, it was great, we talked about participation, giving responsibility and ownership, giving space for young people who might struggle with limited attention, behavioural issues like ADHD, about valuing their voice and interruptions, about the varied ways of learning, using bodies, using senses, not just minds, about being present and ensuring a good welcome.

It was just fabulous.

Only.

It wasn’t was it.

Sadly it wasnt about young people at all.

This list was about how to make worship accessible to older folks in care homes, led by the chaplains at Methodist homes association.

Oh.

It was about being accessible, inclusive, participatory, sensory, gentle, relational, challenging but not patronising, meaningful and respectful, responsive and also planned, with adults in a care home setting. How to respond to interruptions of their body functions, illness, about keeping things familiar , about encouraging it to be a space where they could have dignity and join in appropriately, it was about recognising the need for safety, for volunteers, for it to be about heart, and head.

What if this was what church was like….normally?

Why isnt it?

Why does the care home get all the good church services?

makes me think that I can’t wait to be old.

If church can be participative and accessible in the community setting of a care home (with all the inspection, guidance, social control, policies) – then why cant it be like this in its own setting? And yes sometimes it is…

If you were to ask young people about how they would want to make church more accessible to them – so many of these things would be said. In fact this is what research showed a few years ago.

In that piece I shared that from the research by Fuller , these were the headlines…in 2017..

When I look at the way in which the examples of church are described in ‘Here be Dragons; Youthwork and Mission off the map’ (2013) – they are all very similar – youth congregations in community settings with a space to worship that they have ownership, participation, serving, ceremony, sacredness, community and giving – also inclusive and open, with public facing and interruptions. Not unlike the care home.

I just found the similarities fascinating and revealing today, so I thought id share them with you.

Because…young people are just people after all….- and accessible church might be good for everyone…mightn’t it?

Growing, Sowing, Planting- But what we know about soil?

On By JamesIn Context, Mission, YouthworkLeave a comment

Planting, Sowing, Growing, Re-wilding, Seeds, Growth, Pruning, Fruit,

Doesnt it feel that many of the churches strategies have a farming metaphor complex about them at times, and yet, aside from the farmer, and the weather, all of them require something that is rarely talked about.

So let me ask you a question.

What do you know about soil?

Its essential for pretty, id say all of the growing of anything. So what do you know about it?

I dont know much. The tiny bit I knew I gleaned from you tube videos as I was building and creating a home allotment bed a few years ago

You mean to say that I shouldn’t be digging over my allotment every year?

Said a friend to me recently when he shared the back breaking work of maintaining a small raised bed.

So what do you know about soil?

The good soil is the one in which the seed when planted delves deep , its roots form and fruit is produced, good soil is also a place in which both wheat and weeds inhabit. It is required for growth, regardless of what is grown. (Matthew 15)

Over the past month I have been reading James Rebanks book ‘The English Pastoral’ which is all about farming in Cumbria. 3-4 generations of farming in Cumbria, and the 1000’s of years prior too. They stand on the stiles of stone walls.

You would think that a farmer, and a history of farming in a land, would know about soil, but, actually what surprised me was that they didnt.

Well, actually.. thats not quite true. They knew intuitively about soil. They just didnt know it as a technology.

Soil was the lifeblood of the farm. It was a part of the farm. A character.

It had been tended to, on rotation for centuries. Never allowed to be exhausted by one crop, or concentrated by the manure of animals for too long, or left barren and empty for too long either. It was given rest, recuperation, growth periods, nutrients in, space to breathe, and had crops rotated on it so that it didnt get drained.

And it was hard work. The Farmer didnt know about the soil, but knew the importance and value of the soil.

Farmers learned the hard way through endless experiments, trial and error, discovering that if we over exploited our soil, ecosystems would collapse, and our ability to live and prosper with it. Fields could not produce the same crops over and over again without becoming exhausted. This was because each crop took nutrients from the soil, emptying its bank of fertility eventually, and then crop diseases would build up in the tired ground and they become devastating. Nature would punish the farmer for his arrogance.

Whole civilisations disappeared because their farming methods degraded their soils, the solution was rotational farming…

James Rebanks, 2020, p 102

However, as James says..

It seemed kind of amazing to that I could have grown up on a farm and had eleven years of schooling and never once had anyone tell me why these things were done (talking of rotational farming)

What he noticed from his grandfather was that there was an ongoing cycle, and that barely a thing was wasted from the farm. So much was returned back to the soil eventually.

Intuitively a farmer had known about the soil. Intuitively, after years and decades of trial and error.

But as James explains, in detail. The need for cheaper food, the pull of the market, and the expanded use of chemicals, both to fertilise and to reduce pests, changed farming, and changed the soil.

Farms became machines in themselves. Just a means to an end.

Farmers were enslaved by economists.

It became a new normal but it wasnt normal at all.

The way animals were now housed meant that they got more disease which meant more drugs and then solutions to alleviate the pests that were caused by a situation that was deemed progress, and as a result,

Farmers trying to persue intensive methods of animal production were prone to suffer catastrophic losses

Rebanks 2020, p130

Traditional pastoral systems tended to mimic what worked in the wild; grazing cattle or sheep were healthiest when they were herded around a range of habitats or by a shepherd or a cowherd, or left to their own devices across landscapes. new intensive farming placed animals in surroundings that made them distressed, diseased, dirty and stressed. The more of progress we saw, the less we liked it.

Revelation arrived about the damage of progress, was beginning. By sight the once varied landscape was now a monotonous colour of artificially fertilised evergreen crop, the same every year. Old buildings torn down and replaced by metallic monochrome structures, Tractors got bigger and bigger, fences knocked down and hedgerows destroyed to make their access and productivity increase. Rather than admire these, the traditional farmer saw these as ghastly.

But some of those bigger farms went bankrupt. There was no pleasure in seeing friends lose farms.

Revelation also happened in the soil.

As James Rebooks dad had began to discover, the truth was discovered in the soil.

There were no birds chasing the tractor in a factory farm. The soil was dead. No worms for the birds, no food for the nesting birds to find. The high volume grass for the cows created a toxic slurry, that when excreted didnt furnish the land with nutrients it had before. The Cycles of life had been broken. New farming had taken two mutually beneficial things, grazing animals and fertilising fields and separated them to create two massive industrial scale problems in two places. Farms with muck had too much, and farms with crop had not enough, and then had to rely on chemicals. Livestock bred on chemical feed was producing toxins, everywhere life was being killed off… for the sake of progress.

Outcomes – cheap food

Technology – to make life easier, bigger and more effective

Nothing was valued, and machines and technology was worshipped. (p186)

We didnt think it was our job to to know, or care, we were too busy doing other things, if large corporations gave us things we wanted, we let them. But it was an illusion, an industrial arrogance, a future that didnt work, a dystopia. What we do know in our hearts – even the most optimistic of us- is that finding our way back will take time and faith, and a radical structural changes in our relationship with food and farming

Rabanks p187

Had a devastating effect, though very gradual at the time on the soil. It was a change that took only 40 years to do, to affect the 1000’s of years before it.

One effect of the many changes in that soil and the landscape was that it was so uniformed and straightened, that when water hit it in tumultuous amount, Carlisle and much of the Lake District was flooded.

Farmers realised that they had been listening to economists for too long.

In the last chapter of the book James describes the future, not nostalgia or progress but the future.

One in which the reversal of uncritiqued progress had started to take place.

One in which the soil is treated as it should be. One in which the land is seen, as the ecosystem of vibrancy and beauty, and not just a technology, a means to an end.

Our land is like a poem, in a patchwork, landscape of other poems, written by hundreds of people, both these here and now and many hundreds that came before us, with each generation adding new layers of meaning and experience. And the poem, if you can read it, tells a complex truth. It has both moments of great beauty and of heartbreak. It tells of human triumph and failing, of what is good in people and what is flawed and what we need, and how in greed we can destroy precious things. It tells of what stays the same and what changes; and of honest hard working folk, clinging on over countless generations, to avoid being swept away by the giant waves of a storm as the world changes. It is also the story of this who lost their grip and were swept away from the land, but who still care, and are now trying to find their way home

Rebanks, p 197

So I wonder, and ask, What might I learn about soil, from one mans experience of three generations of farming, and maybe also, what do I notice about the changes in one industry that resonate with me, as I work in a faith based context. How are we as youth workers, ministers, churches creating the possibility of good, long lasting soil, in which beauty is returning and people can make their way back home? What resistance might there be to ‘soil destruction’ for the sake of outcomes?

Has the church listened to economists too long already and their view of the world seen as default?

So- what do you know about soil? I know a little bit more, just a bit, and ive been awoken to the challenges and experiences of how devaluing the soil has been disastrous for it. Soil itself is so complex that we dont technically know all about it even now, a weave of nutrients, bacteria, organisms that provide an environment for growth.

What is stopped being noticed and a sign that the soil is starting to die, what might be deliberately destroying it?

Maybe the soil isn’t ‘the church’ its also ‘you and me’ (and we are the church) – so what do I do? How do I become, or be healthy soil? What is rotational balance, and what doing I need to do to be the kind of person in which growth occurs without destroying my nature?

I have come that you may have life, life in all its fullness….

After 40 years of absence, James’ farm reverberates with the sounds of the curlews, the colour of the wild flowers, the noise of sheep and cattle in small numbers, the trickle of the winding becks and irregular ponds that scatter the farm. Life has returned. It will not make a profit, but it will live, and be a legacy of life and beauty for his children.

James Rebanks, The English Pastoral. I highly recommend it.

Contains Trauma: Handle with Care

On By JamesIn Context, Youthwork, Youthwork management, Youthwork MethodsLeave a comment

Maybe I’m the sensitive one?

Maybe I’m the critical one?

Maybe I’m the one triggered?

After receiving trauma therapy. In the beginning of a personal remake from Trauma. In the process of learning about trauma from reading, and attending a few introductory sessions on this subject, and following therapists and trauma specialists on social media. I am not the only one concerned.

Dealing with Trauma is not a tick box

Dealing with Trauma is not a token

Dealing with Trauma is not simple

Dealing with Trauma is not to become opportunist

Dealing with Trauma will require cost, significant cost.

Dealing with Trauma is not a ‘mission field’

Dealing with Trauma requires awareness of Traumas, and includes Spiritual Abuse. God is not the help in times of trouble you may want him to be. That sentence alone has triggered some as they read this.

Maybe its my social media feed right now, or the last 12 months, but during the pandemic, the whole business of becoming ‘trauma informed’ has become a label like ‘being a positive employer’ or a title that pronounced to attempt to engender some kind of ‘safety’.

Thats not how Trauma works for the Trauma survivor.

I think what Im trying to say, is that dealing with peoples Trauma requires care, diligence, education, and is a huge responsibility.

Its not to be done on the cheap and as Lisa Cherry, Trauma specialist writes here, bypassing the experts for cost reasons.

Is not a tag on to say ‘We’re now trauma informed’ lets carry on with how we’ve always worked bullying and harassing people.

It really isnt the first time that in the faith sector the accusation can get hurled that amateur do-gooders that may end up doing more harm. Someone once read a book on adolescent development and can now run training courses on Trauma. Someone led a 10 week ministry on Anger Management and now sells themselves as an international speaker on it from something they did 15 years ago.

This isnt what we’re doing in the faith sector is it..?? Not on something like Trauma?

Really?

If I said to you that I attended some training this week that proclaimed that it was an introduction to being trauma informed…and yet didnt spend any time looking at Trauma at all.. would you believe me? – But it happened. ..

If I said to you that in that same training that its default was that an evangelical theology was the default for understanding trauma, and that theory was to back this up..would you believe me… but it happened…

If I told you that none of the above picture was mentioned as part of the behaviours that could indicate Trauma would you believe me… well it happened..

If I said to you that in trauma training (that didnt include trauma), methods of regulation with young did not account for complex diagnosis like ADHD and mental Health, or PTSD.. but that is what happened…

If I told you that encouraging young people to pray during breathing exercises to ask God to be their ‘perfect relationship’ when they had damaged family ones, was suggested – would you believe me…but it happened…

If I told you that in a ‘conversation introducing trauma’ there was no opportunity to ask questions and the zoom chat was disabled – a monologue for 90 mins with a break in-between, it didnt even create a trauma safe environment in its delivery.

Im not going to mention the name of this organisation, but its at least the 2nd one that is currently delivering material that encourages ‘Trauma informed’ in churches. Theres misgivings about the other course too, from specialists in the sector. I have fed this all back to the organisation in question.

I could go on. Maybe Im missing something, maybe not for the first time in my life Im the cynical sensitive one. Im happy to be accused of being these things, so that the love and care that we have for people as a church is healthier and whole.

‘No one can afford specialist responses to Trauma’ … well in that case… better to leave alone, that make things worse.

My Trauma took years for me to deal with, it may not be required that young people want to deal with it right now. If you want to pay for a young person to get specialist trauma care, then pay for it with a private child psychologist. That would do the world of good, for that young person.

‘Well meant but rubbish’, in the case of Trauma might add layers of trauma on to the original trauma itself.

Trauma is Fragile: Handle with care.

My own Trauma Education has begun with reading the following books ‘The Body Keeps the Score’ (2014) and Lisa Cherrys ‘Conversations that make a difference for Children and young people’ (2021) – I’d recommend both. There are many many others too. Theres also Lisa Cherrys Blog here, parts 1-3 on Trauma informed ways of being are good

On Creating Trauma informed organisations, this is another resource.

‘Is church social action; Colonialism wearing the mask of love?’

On By JamesIn Context, Discipleship, Mission, Theology, Youthwork MethodsLeave a comment

Love is patient

Love is Kind

Love is not self serving

Love…

I have to thank both Cormac Russell and Jen Johnson for the stimulation to write this piece. In a twitter conversation this week

Cormac shared the phrase itself, or a variant of it here

How often , as Candice points out do organisations use the term ‘non engaging’, ‘resilient’ and ‘hard to reach’. Its something ive definitely written about before. Especially when the funders come knocking at the door.

But then my friend Jen Johnson wrote this:

Do Church based ‘Social Action Projects’ often run the risk of fitting this description?

Of being ‘Colonialism/Empire: wearing the mask of love

So I wonder.

What is the motivation of ‘church based social action projects’ – including the ones I have worked for, and do work for now?

Is it to ‘pure’ to do social action from as faith perspective – without expectation?

Is it considered a ‘waste of time’ to work with some communities ‘because they dont come to church’?

Does the ‘love’ that is shown – that often looks like ‘serving needs’ – a mask for ‘hopefully if we’re nice to people then they think the church is ok’ ?

As another comment suggested – whilst a default is to look at a community with needy eyes – looking at what is needed and the gaps in the community – then the a church or organisation can play ‘rescuer’ or ‘fixer’ or saviour. Sometimes thats the look the church wants. Sometimes that temptation runs very deep. Its an organisational codependency thats impossible to shift.

I have heard it said that im a dreamer, and that in the ‘real world’ the church is empty and this is what the priority should be

I have heard it said to clergy that they are not social workers – and that ‘their job is discipleship’ not social work.

A reality is that most people don’t believe you when you say you are doing something for nothing. The problem is that for too many people they’ve been on the receiving end of toxic gifts the church has offered, that have never been free. Friendship evangelism was never friendship or evangelism.

So let me ask you, to reflect on the question

Is your understanding of the mission of God – ‘colonialism; wearing the mask of love’?

Or should we abandon masking love at all and just do colonialism – full on street preaching that in its method has barely love.

Or just ‘love’ because – thats a gospel command, to love one another, love your neighbour, love yourself, love God.

Can we loosen the ties of empire and colonialism – for the sake of love?

If actions of ‘love’ ; have to be justified by impact or growth – is that love – or a clashing gong or symbol?

I am questions, because I ask myself the same questions. Have I been implicit in this? Have I as a Christian done similar things, fell into the trap, a trap I am now more aware of, yes id like to think not, but certainly in some organisations, love plays second fiddle to evangelism, in others I worked for love was a motivator, but ‘the churches were empty of young people’ was more explicit. What was my task in the midst, to navigate a path my pwn integrity struggled to cope with, and ultimately couldn’t. I would rather be accused of being a dreamer and unrealistic I suppose and fall into the cracks, still believing and hoping and loving. Maybe from a point of being frustrated that loving has been diluted with expectation has emerged my own criticisms of others, yet I know, an I am learning to be better. Ultimately in all things, change starts with me, starts from the inside and works out wards. But sometimes, like the conversation above, I need my own poke from a loving prompting stick.