Pray For The Young

“Ten years from now,” a wise man said, “you’ll be the same person you are today … except for the people you meet, and the books you read.” ‘m thinking “books” could be stretched to include almost anything we peruse with a little serious attention. For me, this week, that would include an article by the ever-thoughtful Michael Brendan Dougherty, musing on why current generations are drifting so rapidly from the deepest convictions of their ancestors.

It happened that the subject was much on my mind, because of the people I'd just met. I'd spent a few days interacting with a couple of dozen college and just-out-of-college men and women. Each of them expressed faith in Christ, and all of them were participating in a journalism academy, exploring ways to use their well-honed communication skills to build a successful career in the mainstream media.

I watched as they listened to speakers who themselves express faith, and who’ve already achieved the kind of success these young men and women dream of, plying their trade for outlets like The Wall Street Journal, The Federalist, and Fox News. I listened to the neophytes’ questions, saw their furrowed brows processing the answers, spied as they typed their notes and produced stories for competition.

It occurred to me that for these young people, the Obama administration is ancient history. Ronald Reagan is no more real to them than George Washington. They seem considerably more mature and thoughtful than others their age whom I see interviewed, from time to time, on television. They’re certainly in tune with their own culture – know the buzzwords, embrace the technology, follow the latest trends in politics and entertainment.

In no time at all, they’ll be moving into positions of responsibility and influence. They’ll be shaping the message, setting the tone, providing the voices that will speak their generation’s take on the truths of God and man.

My own peers and I see in their eyes, hear in their voices, flickers of ourselves at their age and station of life. They’ve never been old, but we have been young … and the myriad factors that shaped us, for better or worse, are mostly gone now.

Whatever these young people ultimately become, it will almost certainly be something very different from us.

Dougherty quotes the British philosopher Michael Oakeshott, who observed that the youth of each generation tend to grow more conservative with age. Only – that’s not happening with the two latest generations, Millennials and Generation Z. Dougherty wonders why.

Oakeshott surmised that conservatism takes strongest root in individuals who a) understand how much they have to be grateful for, and b) recognize the very real possibility of losing it. Dougherty wonders if that’s the stumbling point for today’s young men and women.

Statistics show that these most recent generations are not especially interested in marriage. They’re dramatically less interested in having children. They’re in no hurry to buy a home. They show little enthusiasm for participating in community organizations, playing (or even watching) sports, joining clubs, or contributing to charities, if the contribution requires any time or effort beyond logging on to GoFundMe.

They wouldn’t be caught dead in church.

In short, they take no pride or pleasure in meeting people, starting a family, contributing to society … or knowing God. Theirs is an increasingly small world, with no curiosity about history and no great faith in the future.

Small wonder that so many are lonely, depressed, deeply intimidated by life, and suicidal.

History records that the world I grew up in was pretty intimidating, too. My family knew tragedies and heartbreaks; our world teemed with political dissension and social upheaval.

What’s more, for most of my growing up years and young adulthood, the conveniences of today were missing: no personal computers or laptops or cell phones. At my house, we were slow being able to afford VCRs and microwaves, answering machines and toaster ovens.

But the shows I watched on TV, by and large, affirmed what I was learning from my parents and hearing at church, about right and wrong, courage and sacrifice, the transcendence of love and inevitability of pain and loss. The songs on our records and that we listened to on the radio recognized those realities, too.

My parents stayed together, and wanted to, and I grew up watching them steal kisses in the kitchen and giggle at each other’s teasing across the dinner table. My week was filled with church services and activities, and I grew up studying the character of people who professed to follow Christ. I learned to measure souls by actions, and words against the truth of Scripture.

The culture in which today’s young people are immersed offers little of any of that. Their entertainment is cynical and filled with anti-heroes; their songs are biting and bitter, snarky and sad. They’ve been tutored in self-indulgence by estranged parents who practice it themselves. They’ve been urged toward contempt for their country and indifference to their God – and told their only hope lies in limitless government, a pitiless social code, a constantly re-invented reality … and the purging of every discomfort and disagreement from their lives.

So I found myself looking at the thoughtful, polite, engaging young men and women I met this week like the soldiers in the boats off Omaha Beach, half-a-century ago – bombs falling all around them, as they each await, trembling, their turn to make their own lonely charge into the brutal barrages of an enemy eager to destroy them.

Yes, that’s a pretty grim vision, I’ll grant you. Let me season it with this.

God knows – He always knows – the ages and eras His children are born into. He knows the challenges this generation is bound for. He knows how to prepare them, even in a broken, poisonous culture, with what they need for the battles ahead. If it’s Goliath they’re facing, He’ll strengthen their arm and their aim for the sling, and place the hard stones in their hand.

It’s easier, most days, to roll our eyes at their choices than to pray for their souls. Easier to preach than to listen. Easier, too, to hug and ignore what’s wrong, or just creep quietly away, than to speak hard truths in tender love.

Here is a hard truth, painfully learned and plainly spoken by Mattie Ross in True Grit:

“You must pay for everything in this world, one way or another. There is nothing free except the grace of God.”

She’s right, of course. That’s the bad news, in every generation. And also – always – the best.