This past Sunday, our assistant pastor said goodbye to our parish after
three years of faithful service to our parish community. As Father Swann Kim reflected on his time at
St. Paul’s at the end of Mass (one year as a deacon and two years as a priest),
he choked up in a touching and genuine display of emotion. On cue, many in the congregation (including
this writer) had to wipe away tears as we listened to Fr. Swann speak about how
we had all become his family and that he was sad to move on.
Fr. Swann won’t be too far as he takes up residence at Our Lady of
Assumption Parish in Port Coquitlam. As
with many of the priests who have lived with and learned from Monsignor
Luterbach, Fr. Swann will likely become a pastor somewhere in the
not-so-distant future. Life at St. Paul
Parish will go on, in large part to the strong leadership of Msgr. Luterbach
and countless others in the parish community.
As well, we are all excited as to what our new assistant pastor Father
Rodney Nootebos will bring to our parish.
In reflecting on this transition, I started to relate it to youth ministry
(surprise, surprise). In particular, it
underscored for me the importance of having a good transition plan in place
when a parish youth ministry coordinator or youth minister moves on...for
whatever reason.
It’s happened before: a popular,
highly-competent and highly-effective youth ministry coordinator leaves a
parish and youth ministry seemingly leaves with her. The parish is apparently caught off-guard
(even though it knew this day was coming) and youth ministry has a hard time
recovering, if at all. All because the
church’s youth ministry efforts were tied directly to its leader and not to the
community.
Part of my role is to aid in this vital transition period so youth ministry
doesn’t fall off the map in both the eyes of the pastor and the church community. Thus, I offer three ways to ensure that youth
ministry doesn’t leave with the outgoing youth minister:
1. Mentoring. Youth ministry is a prime opportunity for
solid mentoring and leadership development.
Even the best youth ministers know that they aren’t going to be around forever;
the smartest ones will realize this before it’s too late. A strong leader should be able to identify
and perhaps even groom one or two people to take his spot...without feeling
threatened. Leadership always needs to
be evolving....otherwise our ministry isn’t growing.
2. Create a Job
Description & Procedures. You
might be turned off by reading this one thinking that it’s way too much work. Realize that I’m not talking about lengthy,
complicated, air-tight dissertations here.
But I am talking about concise, pointed documents that will bring
consistency and transparency to the ministry.
Thus, I encourage you to spend some time creating some of these
documents. The last thing you want to
happen is for someone to leave and to take all of the “trade secrets” with her.
3. Know what
you are doing and why. If we are
truly doing our job as youth ministers of leading young people to an encounter
with Jesus Christ, then it shouldn’t matter just who on the team is doing it. Ideally, young people will relate youth
ministry to a multitude of people rather than to just one person. Youth ministry is more than one pastor, one
priest, or one youth minister. We’ll
know we’re doing it right when a prominent leader leaves yet the young people
stay.
I pray that all of our youth ministries are designed so young people
relate their leaders to youth ministry, and not the other way around. That way, when it’s indeed someone’s time to
move on, young people will be able to see that it’s a natural part of growth
and evolvement.
Then it won’t be so hard to say goodbye.
Clayton
Imoo is husband to Gail and father to sons Sean Isaiah and Jacob
Isaac and daughter Kayla Marie. He has served as the Director of the
Office of Youth and Young Adult Ministry of the Roman Catholic
Archdiocese of Vancouver for the past ten years, helping parishes
develop their own youth and young adult ministries. When not doing
ministry, Clay enjoys spending time with his family, playing music,
playing sports, playing naptime, and writing blogs on topics such as
family, faith, and the Vancouver Canucks. Learn more about him at http://www.claytonimoo.com or follow him @claytonimoo
No comments:
Post a Comment