Multigenerational webinar (1)

The Workshop Will Begin in a Moment

Midwest UU Leadership

Faith Formation 2020 and the Multigenerational Community

Introductions

This Conference Is Being Recorded

Faith Formation 2020 and the Multigenerational Community

Midwest UU LeadershipBarb Friedland, Director of Religious Exploration, Thomas

Jefferson Unitarian, Louisville, KY

Nancy Combs-Morgan, Faith Development Director, Heartland District of the UUA

“Who are We and Where Are We Going?”

The first question to consider…is your congregation articulating a goal to be intentionally multigenerational…in worship, service, and religious education?

If so, what then informs your next steps and/or further steps in realizing this goal?

For valuable insights look at, “Faith Formation 2020”

DESIGNING THE FUTURE OF FAITH FORMATION

JOHN ROBERTO, LIFELONGFAITH ASSOCIATES(JROBERTO@LIFELONGFAITH.COM)

Multigenerational Focus

What could faith formation look like in 2020?

Specifically, how can congregations provide vibrant faith formation to address the spiritual and religious needs of all ages and generations over the next 10 years?

www.faithformation2020.net

Driving Forces

Driving forces are the forces of change—social, economic, political, technological, educational, cultural, and religious—that are most likely to affect the future shape of faith formation.

The trends in this study indicate a need for congregations to incorporate a greater intentionality around multigenerational programming.

1. Will trends in U.S. culture lead people to become more receptive to organized religion, or will trends lead people to become more resistant to organized religion?

2. Will people’s hunger for and openness to spiritual life increase over the next decade or will people’s hunger for and openness to spiritual life decrease.

Two Critical Uncertainties

4 Scenarios for the Future

Multigenerational Strategies

Targeting generations iGeneration Millennials Gen X Baby Boomers

Targeting young familiesEmpowering the community to

share their faithOnline & digital faith formation

Generationally-Specific iGeneration (2000 - ) Millennials (1980-1999) Generation X (1964-1979) Boomers (1946-1964) Builders (up to 1945)

What does

digital natives: web, social networking, digital media

formed by media & visual learners ability to use technology to create a

vast array of content openness to change desire for immediacy learning style: active, engaged, creative

(project-centered), visual, practice & performance, digital

What does

Expressive CommunalismEmerging adults have embedded their

lives in spiritual communities in which their desire and need for both expressive/experiential activities, whether through art, music, or service-oriented activities, and for a close-knit, physical community and communion with others are met.

Expressive Communalism expressive/experiential faith

activities (worship, learning, rituals, prayer) and physical community with others

a faith that makes cognitive sense to them and that is also an expressive, embodied spiritual experience

Creating deeper community through small groups

Making a difference through service Experiencing worship – reflecting their

culture and revering and revealing God (visual, musical, artistic, experiential)

Exploring religious tradition with depth, questioning, and applying faith to life

Utilizing the technology to communicate the message and to connect people

Building cross-generational relationships Forming the spiritual life – spiritual

practices & disciplines

Desire first for community and belonging, and second for personal fulfillment.

Truth, for Xers, is best conveyed through stories and myth, and is authenticated through the lived experience of themselves and others, rather than through the pronouncements—and propositional arguments—of external authorities.

Generation X is moving from written text to narrative and image as a basis for religious belief.

There is a move from the essentially individualistic spiritual quest that characterizes baby boomers to a religious/spiritual identity rooted in the larger community.

Greater individual authority in religious and moral decisions.

Religious identity chosen through experience and study.

Choosing a specific community, rather than committing to a larger denomination.

Being experientially engaged in a religious community, not “show up and watch”

interpersonal relationships with people who express and explore their religious identities in similar ways

Service: Boomers want to do something interesting and challenging.

Boomers want service opportunities that have a mission. They want do to do things that give their lives purpose, meaning, and fulfillment. They want to know their contributions truly matter

Spiritual Growth: Later Adulthood is a season of significant life transitions and people are more responsive to religion.

A reason adults are open to faith and spiritual growth is their desire for meaningful relationships. small group faith formationhost events that appeal to interests &

needsservice opportunities

Intergenerational Relationships: Developing intergenerational relationships is one of the best ways to break age-related stereotypes, to share faith across generations, and to help the church become more unified encourage generations to serve together form groups according to similar interests

rather than age ask adults to tell their stories, at events or

programs, and capture them on video or in print

Spiritual enrichment: “spirituality of aging” programs, spiritual disciplines and practices, retreats, rituals to acknowledge life transitions

Learning: book clubs, classes and courses, Bible study, small groups, trips

Nutrition and wellness: exercise programs, nutrition classes, healthy meals with programs

Intergenerational: activities, coaching, mentoring

Service: tutoring, service—local and global, church ministry

Community: social activities, trips, dinners, pilgrimages

Gil Rendle, Alban Institute

As leaders trying to understand generational differences, it is more helpful to back away from all of the … differences…all of these generational cohorts do, in fact, have their own preferences and life lessons that make them different from one another…

But each of these generational cohorts shares a need for a personal faith lived in community (a congregation), and each of these generational cohorts lives, daily, in a multigenerational environment. “Generational Worship in a Multigenerational World”

Gil Rendle, Alban Institute, cont.

In today's congregations such multigenerational voices that speak out of different value systems are commonly in competition, if not contention, making leaders particularly uncomfortable. It is difficult to have it both ways when facing competing preferences.

Despite the discomfort, such negotiating over worship is a sign of health in the congregation

Lifelong faith formation that is generationally-specific, developed around the specific characteristics of the five generations in a faith community

ANDintentionally intergenerational across all generations in learning, service/mission, worship, community life

What does

Intentionally Intergenerational intergenerational learning: large

group and small group Intergenerational study intergenerational service projects

and mission trips infuse intergenerational

relationships into existing age-group programming , e.g., mentoring

What does

Mobilize the Whole Faith Community through an Annual Church-Wide Project. Develop an annual church-wide justice and service project with local-global connections.

Focus on a project, such as adopting a local or global action project organized by an organization, or focus an annual theme, such as poverty, care for creation, or peacemaking.

For each annual theme develop a comprehensive set of programs and resources (often available from organizations you partner with) for all age groups, families, and the whole community.

Develop faith formation (learning, worship/ritual, faith practices) around lifecycle milestones, celebrations, and life transitions to deepen people’s faith, strengthen their engagement in church life, and equip them with practices for living their faith.

Multigenerational Strategies

Move from solely having separate age groups using a curriculum to a Lifelong Learning Network approach

Provide 24 x 7 x 365 faith formation for all ages and generations—anytime & anywhere

Integrate multigenerational faith formation in physical settings—church, home, community—with virtual (online) faith formation opportunities —websites, and on-line learning programs

www.faithformationlearningexchange.net

Multigenerational Resources

The Thematic Church, http://themebasedministry.org

Making Worship Part of Kid’s Lives, Don Skinner, www.uua.org/leaders/leaderlibrary/leaderslibrary/interconnections/158588.shtm

 Ten Good Ideas about Multigenerational Worship, Rev. Phil Lund, www.philontheprairie.wordpress.com/category/multigenerational/

Hardwired to Connect, www.americanvalues.org

Multigenerational Resources

“Creating a Multigenerational Culture,” Michelle Richards, (Interconnections Tipsheet), www.tipsheets.blogs.uua.org/2009/08/28/creating-a-multigenerational-congregation/

Michelle Richards, Come into the Circle: Worshiping with Children. http://www.uuabookstore.org/productdetails.cfm?PC=579

Maria Harris, “Fashion Me a People”

Multigenerational Resources

Multigenerational resources at uua.org, http://www.uua.org/religiouseducation/multigenerational/index.shtml

The Multigenerational Congregation:Meeting the Leadership Challenge, Gilbert Rendle, www.alban.org

Multigenerational:A Family Under One Sky, Unitarian Universalist Church of Las Cruces, NM

(website)www.uuchurchlc.org 

Q & A

Thank You