Children and young people
Children and young people now live in a world where the demands for their attention are stridently all around as never before. The advances in electronic forms of mobile communication, computers and games software, coupled with ever more commercially aggressive and visually high-quality advertising targeting young consumers presents a challenge to the church - how can it attract and keep the young in the face of this information bombardment?
With the increasing drift of society towards acceptance of behaviours and moralities which run counter to the Christian lifestyle, and which are daily exemplified on much mainstream graphic television programming and in computer games which portray extreme violence, young people can easily form the impression that the church is an irrelevant and outmoded institution, completely at odds with the 'real' world.
Children and young people who are involved in their church are sometimes subject to negative reactions from their peers, who do not have an understanding of what the church represents.
Parishes can play a vital part in encouranging positive participation by children and young people as they are best placed to engage with local communities at grass roots level, to understand the local social and economic dynamics and to provide the necessary support which will gain the interest of parents, carers and young people - the relevance of the gospel message of love will never be outmoded but our expressions of it might well be, at least at the point of first contact with non-church families.
The Diocese has a children and young people's matrix group, which brings together key people working across the age groups. The group shares experiences and ideas about how we can all develop and improve the church's work with children and young people in the Diocese. The group meets three times a year and seeks to feed into the whole life of the Diocese. The matrix group is chaired by the Bishop of Southampton.
Faith development for children and young people