Participation, Football, And Spirituality

I like participation. It's a value of youth work I hold to very strongly.

So when starting with a group of young men who had 'outgrown' the kids club and needed something more I asked them for suggestions of things they'd like to do as a group. I was expecting the usual lethargy which they had to be encouraged out of.

"Start a football team to play in the under 14s league" was the response I got". Participation is good, encouraging young people in their talents, in their ambitions, giving them an opportunity to achieve, but whenever I've done empowerment stuff with young people before it's always been empowering them to do stuff that I could fairly easily take in my stride.

Yesterday four young men well and truly challenged me to: discover something that I could be part of acheiving that I've never thought I could be part of achieving, get new skills, make new contacts, and generally stretch myself. They see the peice of groupwork as something they can do easily- set up a football team- I'm absolutely terrified by the idea, and don't know where the hell to start. Makes me wonder who's 'doing' the youth work and who's being worked with here! It reminds me of Donovan's overused quote from Christianity Re-discovered:

"when working with young people do not try to
draw them back to the place where they have been, do not try to take them to the
place where you are, however beautiful a place that may seem to you, rather have
the courage to go with them to where you or they have never been before."

I'm off to find out about sunday leagues in the area, find out if they can join a local community coaching programme, find out if we can have somewhere regular to practice, find a coach(!), and figure out how a peice of groupwork based on starting and developing a football team can work with deeper issues of faith, existence, and the Kingdom of God. If this comes off I really am going somewhere with these young men where I have never been before. I need them, probably as much as they need me, I feel unsure, insecure, and vulnerable. I hope I don't let them down!