Why ARE youth in church?

Why ARE youth in church?

By Jacob Nez for Episcopal Cafe

Every time someone whines about youth not being in Church I feel like dirt, like we who do go to church don’t exist. 

I am 18 and I and 41 other youth in the Spirit Journey Youth Group go to the Episcopal Church. We don’t always go at the same time because we don’t have transport. We also have to pick and choose a Church that will welcome us. We are youth and we are Native Episcopalians. There is a lot of racism in some of these churches.  None of us live on the Reservations. We live in five border towns in N. Arizona. We are from four Native Nations in Arizona and New Mexico.

All of us came to the Church through the Spirit Journey Youth group in the Diocese of Arizona. When we began 12 years ago as a group, we were a lot of trouble. We would go to Church as a group and squirm around a lot. Kaze Gadaway, our youth minister had to tell us when to sit and kneel. A lot of the congregation complained about our being there.

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