O.K., so I need to give credit where credit is due. Marko (Mark Oestreicher President of Youth Specialties) from Youth Specialties did respond to my email letter that I had sent to him. It was the subject of the previous post. I wanted to get that out in the open. I have decided to post our exchange for the benefit of everyone. Thanks again for responding Marko.
Here's Marko's initial response:
Oestreicher, Mark wrote .. Hey matt - sorry it's been so long since you wrote. Busy month.
Well, I hear what you're saying. And not to be defensive, but I've been expressing culpability on behalf of YS for two or three years now. I feel like YS was the leading instigator in the "professionalization" of youth ministry, and in creating or promoting many (probably not all) of the crappy models and assumptions we're now working to dismantle or move beyond. I say "not all", because - for instance - YS has never had a big value on numbers (attendance, or 'decisions') as a good measuring stick, and those seem to be such predominantly harmful guiding values in the youth ministry world (well, in the whole church world, to be honest).
I do not, however, feel the best response to evil
(including participation in it)
is to spend the rest of my life expressing culpability. There is value in that, yes. But, ultimately, there is MORE value (yes, I think it's an issue of priorities) in starting to define and practice a new way. Anyhow - thanks for your thoughts! marko
Here was my reply:
Mark- Thank you for being willing to even reply. I appreciate that a great deal. Indeed I think you are right that ongoing expressions of culpability become unecessary at some point. My perspective on what YS has been doing the last few years is limited. As I said, this was my first conference in some time. I just wanted to share what a VERY SMALL portion of the event looked like to me. I can't express enough how excited I was overall about the direction that YS has taken since I was last there. It was so refreshing to me and was totally the opposite of what I had expected from YS. I know that probably did not come through in my email. You all are in my prayers. Continue going forward with your good work. Matt Overton
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