JESUS YOUTH | KAIROS GLOBAL | DECEMBER 2019

Author: Dr Edward Edezhath

How do you begin Jesus Youth in a new place?

A few months back while I was busy with a class, there was a call on my cellphone. It was my bishop. “Can you come over here?” – I was in the middle of the class. “The matter is this”, he continued, “here is a bishop visiting from another country and he has a lot of questions on Jesus Youth. And I said I will connect to the most suitable person.” So finally, I agreed to go to the bishop house in the evening. Later I had a long chat about the movement with this bishop. And it led to the most important question, ‘I want to have Jesus Youth in my diocese, how can it be done?’

I have been part of quite a few other organizations. When someone asks you to start a unit at their place, the answer is quite clear and often, there are a few simple steps to start the organization in that place. But in the case of Jesus Youth it is not so simple. For instance, when this bishop asked me to initiate the movement in his diocese, I immediately asked a few Jesus Youth from another city in the same country to get in touch with the bishop. I also asked the bishop to send some young people to be part of a Jesus Youth conference that was being organized in another part of the same country. In short, I was not immediately starting a group, but initiating some contacts, so that slowly some strong relationships would be built up. Somehow, starting Jesus Youth in an area is not directly starting its unit there, but building some contacts and slowly developing some people with a distinct vision and commitment.

Some remote preparation

Recently, one family that was part of our JY small group migrated to another continent. Benson, Suma and their three kids had to do a lot of preparation for this complete relocation. Both were quite active in the movement and their greatest difficulty in connection with the migration was losing the loving and caring ambience of Jesus Youth in their hometown. So, even before they asked about a job or a house, they were enquiring how they can have a Jesus Youth group in their destination city. They soon realized that there was no JY group in that part of the world. This led them to some preparatory steps. 

Invariably the first step is an earnest spiritual preparation. You and your friends start offering that place to the Lord, asking for his intervention there. We met together many times, discussed about the possibilities in that new place and offered it in prayer. A second step is making connections or networking. Benson and Suma sat with different leaders, got a picture of the local situation and collected contacts of possible support from nearby places. Before they left, they had already enlisted some support when they would reach there. “Do you have some materials to introduce Jesus Youth to some new people,” they asked me. And that was the third remote preparation to start the movement. 

Immersion leading to strong friendships

Starting Jesus Youth at a new place is not primarily an organizational step; it is all about building joyful relationships in that new place. It can be so beautiful and yet challenging. Over the years, the movement has spread far and wide, sometimes in the most unexpected places, mainly due to men and women who went here to join a new course of study, to work in that new place or migrated there as family. JY gets planted and grows in fresh places in a most natural way. But as in the case of any seed sprouting, there is a lot of unseen dreaming, struggling and creative effort to build ‘His Kingdom’ there. 

Going to a totally unknown place can be immensely stressful, but for many active Jesus Youth, as they have an evangelistic intent, the new exposure gets transformed into something of an adventure. Like most of the other active JY in a new place, my two friends also started actively getting immersed in the social life there. Every now and then when they called, they had a lot of good news: ‘We went to the local parish and got to know the pastor there; he introduced us to the key people in the parish council’; ‘They have invited us to a family gathering’; ‘They have a weekly rosary group and dinner and we are going there’; ‘someone from the next parish is contacting us’. Within a couple of months our friends were well acclimatized and were ready to initiate a group there.

Now the actual work begins. With the help of the authorities a one-day session is arranged for those interested. Later a weekend retreat at the end of which a weekly group is announced. A few begin to come regularly. After some months there is a JY training in another city, to which some are sent from this group. Slowly they become part of the network of Jesus Youth. At this point there is a Jesus Youth team and they are connected to the Jesus Youth Council. In this journey of a few months somewhere in between Jesus Youth gets started in that new place.

The bishop of this new place asked our friend, “When does a person actually enter Jesus Youth?” A very difficult question. Is it when he or she comes in contact and starts the journey? Or, when one enters a JY fellowship? Or after some training, renews one’s baptismal vows in the context of the movement? Or when completing the formation process takes a formal commitment and enters the committed phase? At all these points one enters the movement in a special way. Like most things in Christianity, Jesus Youth is all about a deepening relationship and a journey towards holiness and mission. Surely, each of the above steps is a significant immersion into this world of joyful friendship.