Archive for Youth
August 16, 2008 at 6:43 pm
· Filed under Youth ·Tagged Christian fiction, Culture, London trip, novel, shack, theology
I had a great time in UK… though it was short and really busy trip. I was speaking at a youth and family conference. It was great catching up with friends and making new ones. Many of the second generation issues are similar. Western culture has made profound cultural impact on the Indian second generation growing up in Europe. Yet, those kids are so different from kids growing up in North America. More on that later.
One of the highlight of the trip was that I got to read a new novel during the eight hour flight from Chicago to London and back. The preceeding week, Dr. T.V. Thomas (my mentor, the one who wrote foreword and guideded the research on the Coconut Generation) was in town and he gave me a new book called The Shack.
After a long time, I got to read an engaging and stimulating fiction. It is about seeing a human tragedy from an Eternal perspective. Author balances creative imagination with Christian theology. By avoiding simplistic consolation or reductionistic theological argument, author narrates a theological response to a seeminly catastrophic family incident.
But it is not without its share of problems. Controversy abounds in many circles. Trinity is never an easy subject to deal with and explain. Putting flesh and blood on God is problematic. Not to mention race and gender (God the father is presented as an African American woman) biases are stirring up trouble in several theological circles. Some have deeemed the portrayal as erroneous.
Yet I found it as fascinating and soulful. Often stretching my imagination how Christian God looks at mundane earthly matters very differently. At times conversations are less dramatic and somewhat boring. It does not contain the drama and excitement of some of the modern fiction. May be we are used television and movie scripts more these days.
I am also amazed at the success of such narrative in main stream culture. It is among the national best seller lists. Now a movie is being made. Western secularism devoid of spiritual insights are hungry for deeper and fresh reflections on theological themes.
Check out more about the book - www. theshackbook.com Read a detailed review here. Enjoy reading it for yourself, but keep your thinking cap on!
Permalink
July 16, 2008 at 3:51 pm
· Filed under Culture, Family, News, Youth ·Tagged abstinence, British teens, london, oral sex, sex education, teen pregnancy, UK
Heard about this absurdity - British government has urged school kids to try oral sex in order to cut teen pregnancies! Have they gone crazy or what? Do they think it is a novel idea and a creative means to contain a moral dilemma. Read more here. SIFY, Daily Mail, Sun
This advice is a part of Ten Commandments for young people released by chief medical officer Sir Liam Donaldson. He has suggested that teens should limit their sexual contact to touching, fondling and pleasuring each other. Crazy idea indeed. How can anyone stop at that point, without going all the way!
Over 3,000 girls under 16 gave birth in England and Wales in 2006 and 4,700 had an abortion. Under 14 abortions soard 20% last year. The abortion rate was highest for 19-year-olds at 36 per 1,000 girls. Terminations using a pill rather than surgery made up 35 per cent of the total in 2007, compared with 30 per cent in 2006.
This ‘stop-short’ approach is pushing the boundaries and deepening sexual promiscuity among teens. This will not only contain teen pregnancies but cause explosive growth in coming years. It is sure to backfire as many other morally liberal sex-ed stratagies have done before.
In few weeks, I am headed to London to speak at a youth conference there and wanted to see what is going on among youth these days. This was the first news that came across. Disturbing indeed. Would love to hear your comments.
Permalink
July 14, 2008 at 9:32 pm
· Filed under Youth ·Tagged china, gender imbalance, men women, one child, social instability
I recently read a report about a group of young men gangraping a young girl in Southwestern China, which even included son of a local politician. This incident set off a series of protest against government in many parts of China. But all of this is a fallout from China’s famous “one child” policy of 80s and 90s.
The one child were selectively chosen to be male and created the greatest gender imbalance in the history of the world. There are 37 million more men than women in China; and almost 20 percent more newborn boys than girls nationwide. In some parts of China, there are 60 percent more male children than female!
What is the result as these single kid grows into adolescents. China’s juvenile crime rate more than doubled. Significant increase in alcoholism, drug usage, vandalism, and aggressive violent behaviors. Online porn consumption to prostitution ring is wide spread among the next generation of Chinese. Those who are lucky to get married, are also get divorced at record numbers.
Kids grown up in ‘one child homes’ often have poorer peer relational skills. Oppurtunity to interact with opposite sex were limited during growing up years. homosexual tendancies are on the rise. Repressed emotional and sexual pressure is out in the open a decade later. Economic growth alone is insufficient to make strong and stable societies.
With all the focus on China for the forthcoming Olympic games and the Chinese government’s concerted effort to showcase China as a developed and advnaced society, there are fundamental disturbing social trends. Call it the consequence of testostrone build up!
Read the New Republic, Breakpoint, AP etc.
Permalink
June 20, 2008 at 9:13 pm
· Filed under Youth ·Tagged abstinence, contraceptive, pregnancy, sex edu
An appalling story from Massachusetts on teen pregnancy. 17 pregnancies over this past school year in girls age 16 and younger. Many of them made a pact to get pregnant so that they can raise them together. Read the report in US news or watch on AP video on Youtube.
Sex education program in the country is seriously being questioned. Is this the failure of kids, parents, school or the government? Finger pointing is on and it has spurred many ideological conversations. But when these kids drop out of school and end up in welfare, no body blames the school or government policy. In their foolishness, they are seriously sabotaging their own future and precious babies.
Sadly, fathers of these babies does not appear anywhere in this discussion. Pregnancy prevention and contraceptive approach are not enough. If we won’t let them drive on roads or do not consider responsible enough for many adult roles, why do we hesitate to speak against sexual activity before marriage. Abstinence is the best message for such crises and let’s not hesitate to tell the truth to the kids
Permalink
June 14, 2008 at 1:08 pm
· Filed under Youth ·Tagged cohabitation, living together, marriage, marriage project, Popenoe, rutgers
Who wants marriage these days? Just live together and break up when you want. Why sign papers and carry the burden of all legality issues associated with it. Who cares about long term commitment anyway? Relationships are meant to last as long as love lasts. As emotions ebb and flow, so do people wallk in and out of relationships.
What a distrubing line of reasoning that is. Just yesterday my wife was sharing about a colleague who after 5 years of cohabitating just broke up and walked out of the relationship. The emotional fall out is going to last rest of the lives and generations beyond themselves. Our society seems to be so obsessed with ourselves and the present that our capacity to think holistically and long term gets severly impaired.
David Popenoe of Rutgers University has come out with a new report on Cohabitation, Marriage and Child Wellbeing in America. He calls ‘the living together’ phenomena as the strongest force altering family in modern times. Since 1970, when cohabitation was a deviant and illegal practice, this social trend has grown 10 times and now makes up nearly 10 percent of all couples!
Non-marital cohabitation has become a normal part of the life course in the eyes of more than half of young singles in the United States. In 2001a national survey of young adults between the ages of 20 and 29, 43 percent agreed that “you would only marry someone if he or she agreed to live together with you first, so that you could find out whether you really get along.” As of 2002, over 50 percent of women ages 19 to 44 had cohabited for a portion of their lives, compared to 33 percent in 1987 and virtually none a hundred years ago. The yearly number of marriages per 1000 unmarried women age 15 and older has dropped from 76 in 1970 to 41 in 2005.
Social stigma toward cohabitation is waning. Attitude has changed to acceptance and being trendy. Reasoning like pragmatism, cost effectiveness, testrun, hooking up etc seems to dominate young adults as they view relationship. The societal approval of non-marital sex (before, outside of and without marriage), a fallout of sexual revolution of the 1960s, may be at the heart of this social development.
Moreover radical individualism of the Western world, promiscuity of the culture, delay in marriage, changing gender roles etc have contributed toward this trend. Legalistic society that the West has become with high cost of marriage and divorce may be partly blamed. Rise of divorce and singlehood are also other reasons for this social development.
More on this later.
Permalink
June 13, 2008 at 10:20 pm
· Filed under Youth ·Tagged India, murder, record, world
Ever wondered which nation in the world would be called Murder capital of the world. This might come shocking to you. This dubious distinction goes to India, according to recent report. See BBC, Time of India, Gulf Times etc.
According to data put together by National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), there are more than 32000 incident of murder recorded in India during 2007. Twice as that of US or three times that of neighboring Pakistan. India was closely followed by South Africa with nearly 31000 incidents of murders.
The rate of murder in India is three per 100,000 people while that of rape is four in 100,000, according to the government report. But murder rate per capita may be less than many countries due to the large population of India. Of course, these are official figures and there would be thosands of unreported cases in India and other countries as well.
As India tries to portray an image of herself as a bouyant economy, nuclear power and vibrant culture, this comes as a big blow. There exist a deeply divided and deep seated animosity within the society. Communal clashes, religious persecution, expoitation of weak and poor goes on everyday in every city, town and village. The widespread disparity in wealth distribution, lack of diginity for life, fatalistic worldview etc is going to cost India a great deal in containing its aspirations!
Permalink
June 9, 2008 at 3:59 pm
· Filed under Youth ·Tagged children, identity, immigrant, security
I read his distrubing story on children of immigrants in Chicago Tribune. Most of the stories covered were from lower socio-economic class and people south of the US border. But I concur with the struggles of immigrant children and see many similiar trend among Asian Indian community as well.
There is no doubt that immigrant life is hard. But life for the children is even harder. For the later it is social, psychological and spiritual. Being a adolescent has never been easy and it is harder now than ever has been. For immigrant communities, the challenges are multiplied. Need for stability at home and enduring relationship are key to navigating this section of the population into adulthood and responsible citizenry.
When home, church and the nation does not recognize these unique struggles of the next generation, it is tragic. No matter how much of success the immigrant generation are able to achieve,their legacy is short lived. We pay a heavy price thro their marginalization and self destructive behaviors.
Some may say it is not relevant to he Indian America community. We pride in our educational and economic achievement, not to mention our cultural pride. But we are seeing a rise in broken homes, diliquency, drug addiction and gang activities among the second generation of Indian in United States. Many of them come from very educated and successful homes.
When parents are busy pursuing their dreams, children often are neglected and abused in the hand of care givers, neighbors and other relatives. Immigrant parents sacrifice their children on the altar of cultural pride and material accumulationsucces in order to realize their American dreams. Children suffer from loneliness and insecurity, often resulting in confused sense of identity and dwarfed sense of esteem.
When bottom falls out and there are no flicker of hope, some have encounters with God and their life is dramatically transformed. More are falling thro the cracks. Will you stand in the gap?
Permalink
June 3, 2008 at 3:09 pm
· Filed under Youth ·Tagged children, happiness, harvard professor, marriage
Recently a Harvard psychology professor (Dan Gilbert) came out with a book on happiness in marriage. It is called ’Stumbling on Happiness’. See the report in New York Times or Telegraph. See his blog here.
Among the many distorted views being promoted by this researcher is that children spoil happiness in marriage. How wrong this is. It probably is indicative of the growing selfishness of adults in the western culture. Whether it be marriage or children, our culture is all about what is in for me.
A quote from the book, which gives the slant of the entire book, I guess. “When we have an experience . . . on successive occasions, we quickly begin to adapt to it, and the experience yields less pleasure each time,” he writes. “Psychologists calls this habituation, economists call it declining marginal utility, and the rest of us call it marriage.”
Sure, small kids are lots of work and depletes all our resources - time, energy and money. Couples become child-centric and have little or no time for each other. Raising kids is also very expensive these days and involves much sacrifice. But parenting teaches us some very fundamental lessons in life, other, community, faith and God.
The American experiment is based on ‘pursuit of happiness’ and yet it evades most Americans. As long we are obsessed with ourselves and using (even abusing) others for our own selfish gains, we never will find happiness. Marriage and children makes us other centered. It teaches us to serve other sacrificially. It is the only by finding happiness of others that we find ourselves happy.
Materialism or promiscuity can never give lasting happiness. We must turn to spiritual pursuits and return to finding core of our being. Search for ultimate truth about origin, meaning, end of life. Marriage and children are fundamentally makes us to ask deeper questions about life.
Permalink
May 27, 2008 at 10:01 pm
· Filed under Youth ·Tagged bedroom, entertainment, teen, television, youth minsitry
Guess, what are some of underlying causes of unhealthy habits of teens… TV in their bedrooms! A new study published recently by the University of Minnesota School Public Health found that teenagers who have a television in their bedroom are more likely to have unhealthy lifestyles: from poor eating habits, to bad grades, to less time spent with the family. See a report in Science Daily.
We all know having television in kids bedrooms increases media consumption. Kids are more likley to watch shows in the privacy of their rooms what they would not watch in the living room with rest of the family. It also increases sedantry lifestyle, leading to obesity and other health hazards. What they watch also shape their behaviors and character. They become early adopters of fashion, music, food and other cultural products as a result. They consume what is trendy, not necessarily what is healthy.
The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends that parents remove television sets from their children’s bedrooms. Inspite of such warning the stud found two-thirds of teens having television in their bedrooms. Another increasing trend is having laptop with wireless connections of their own. Often parents get such advanced technology to aid their school work, but inceasingly being used for anything but school work.
Dangerous trend indeed that has repercussion on youth ministry. Watch out youtworkers!
Permalink
May 21, 2008 at 5:44 pm
· Filed under Youth
This can happen only in America. A court ruling against its own people. It overturned the refrendum of the people and representative of the people of the state for a ban on gay marriage. This precisely why American style democracy, inspite of best of effort in recent years, is unattractive in other parts of the world. If democracy leads to moral bankcruptcy, people are less drawn to it.
The court argument is convoluted too! They called it natural right. Are they basing it on the statement in Declaration of Independance - “We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men were created equal and endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights.” This is not comparable to human right or civil right. Neither it is akin to ban on interracial marriage.
We must recognize the vital role of the family in building a healthy society and nation. Family is the most fundamental block of the society. When the basic unit gets weak or distorted, so will the nation soon be. There are enough lesson to learn in history from other leading civilizations. The heterosexual family needed to be protected and defended in the law, because it provided crucial benefits for the well-being of family, society and nation.
This high handedness of the court is self destructive for the society in the long run. People get disillusioned if their votes matter at all. A small group of people will continue to exert their influence on the entire country. Social instability will begins to reflect on social tension and economic outputs.
Permalink
« Previous entries
