All who come to this blog: Please comment on whether the youth ministry that you were in as a high school student was ever accused of being cliquey. And... how do you interpret that accusation in retrospect?
I have some thoughts on this but I want to hold off so as not to spoil the soup. (Spoil the soup... did I just type that!?)
humble thoughts on world revolution
People of whom I am very fond:
Things that make me throw up into my mouth
- Richard Simmon's shorts... say NO to man-thigh
- the rate of technological upgrades... I can't catch up.
- English peas
- People who don't understand the zipper way of getting cars out of a lot
- uh... the stomach flu
12 comments:
Right now looking back on it, our group was pretty cliquey, but that didn't mean anyone had trouble getting along. I mean, we all knew which groups we were part of, but the youth group was a whole separate deal and I had friends there who were popular kids and weird kids and smart kids and everything else too. I'd read Jeanne Mayo's "Thriving Youth Groups" and she recommends doing a "death of Mr. Clique" day as a youth group event, which is a neat idea, but my youth minister never really addressed it; he just took care of us all and we thought it was normal for everyone to get along that well.
It's strange when I look at my kids now and how aware they are of the social groups they're part of, and how often they ask, "Who else is coming" as a way to see whether my next event is cool enough to join in, when my experience was so different.
I can't say that it was "cliquey". We were more like a family...I know it sounds weird but it's the truth. As for now, I don't like the term "clique". I know they exist but too many folks use it so easily as to not be in church.
I simply view these "cliques" as a group of friends. There are people I'm naturally drawn to. It does not mean I can't get along with others nor does it mean I hate other groups. We all have folks we gravitate to. I don't think that makes them "cliques".
When I go to family reunions, even though I am related to everyone and love each of them, I do have closer ones I hang with. Now, my goal is to help those pockets or groups of friends interact with each other to create a family.
Does that make sense? Maybe I'm wrong.
I'm not sure, really. I didn't pay much attention to anyone who wasn't in my particular group of friends, so if there was talk of cliques, we wouldn't have noticed.
okay, that is hilarious.
What I'm finding is the one's who are claiming that cliques exist are not the visitors. They are made to feel very welcomed. The ones claiming cliques are the ones who have been attending a while (maybe forever) who feel out of place because others are serving and rather enjoying it. They have come to that point where they know they need to plug in but just can't seem to make the equation Faith + Life = anything.
Robert, I think you are on to something.
I think we kind of go through stages. If people divide into groups everywhere else in society (school, work, people you hang out with, etc.) then how is a youth group going to be any different?
It should be different, but that doesn't mean that it is.
I didn't have a youth ministry to be a part of.
But maybe that was because no one liked me and didn't include me in anything.
Naaaah.
The only people who complained about cliques were all the losers and nerds who wanted to be like me and my friends, and of course, we were like, yeah right, like you're ever going to be like us.
Seriously, I think there's some unavoidable truth to these accusations, but i'm also not even sure that "cliques" are always a bad thing.
Not everyone can be friends with everyone else. Jesus had twelve guys that he hung out with more than the rest of his followers, and he had 3 guys that he seemed to hang out with the most out of those twelve. Paul seemed to have a pretty tight group of people that he was close to, and he even seemed to pick favorites among those (calling Timothy his "son," saying affectionate, personal things to particular folks in his letters to entire churches, etc),
so i think i agree with what seems to be the general opinion so far: that pointing the finger and yelling "clique!" is often just a cop-out.
Well, we got there without me saying anything...
that is the priesthood of believers, folks
I really enjoy reading the comments because I often wondered what good cliques served anyways. Being the nerd I am, I'm going to mention that we just studied this in one of my classes, and interestingly enough, cliques (a group of 6-12 friends) usually do serve a vital purpose in the development of social skills and friendship during adolescence. Crowds, on the other hand, help adolescents will the issue of identity and give a sense of unity and purpose.
While being a member of the youth group or "big church" is helpful in solving the issues of what it means to be 'Christian' and what that looks like, the development of that faith needs to take place in a smaller group - aka "cliques". I am still close to my "clique" from middle school, and actually, in this group of people are still the ones that I find myself turning to for prayer and accountability not the larger crowd of those who were in my youth group.
Whether or not I was successful, overall, I tried to stay out of cliques in the youth group. You drew me out to be a leader which put me into sort of a clique(?), but I still tried to use youth group time to reach out to those who sat by themeselves. So, I can't remember youth group cliques but I do remember school cliques and that was definantly a gift from God.
Ok, I have to say that I at some point of being a teenager in the youth group I'm sure I accused someone, somewhere of being "cliquey." With that said, once I got older and became comfortable with my own group of friends, I just realized that you just become friends with certain people and that is who you hung out with. I do wonder how many alleged "cliques" actually shunned people in the youth group. Even though I did had a small group of friends that I was close to, I don't believe we would have yelled at anyone for appraoching us, telling them that they don't belong. I agree that the term was used very losely when it comes to just talking about groups of close friends.
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