A New Generation of Christians.

Blog family, this is some what scary. If this generation is headed down this road it seems to be way off the mark. I know that I am old school, and I know that things do change but a change like this is way out there. Read the article and leave a comment. I would love to hear from you. What do you think of this new generation of Christians?

It's a new year and the church today faces a generation shifting from the conventional ways of Christianity and exploring more options to live out their faith.

International youth ministry Dare 2 Share has provided a spiritual pulse of today's teens, forecasting the direction Christian teens will head this new year and the challenges they will most likely face.

1. “Go Green” will become the rallying cry for this generation

Today’s teens are looking for a cause to believe in and many will be finding their cause in the Green Revolution. As the Civil Rights Movement and Vietnam War became rallying cries for the younger generation in decades past, this generation of teens is stepping up to embrace the “Go Green” Movement. I thought Jesus was enough to believe in what happen to that?

2. There will be a rising cynicism toward organized religion among teens

While the Millennials do not necessarily harbor negative feelings toward Jesus, they are increasingly disconnecting from the traditional institutions of organized religion. Emancipating themselves from the institutions of their parents, Christian teens will increasingly reject the established, structured churches of their parents’ generation to create newer, more unstructured approaches to living out the spiritual dimension of their lives, exploring options ranging from internet message board communities of faith to gathering with their friends over lattes at their local Starbucks to talk about spiritual things.

3. “Starbucks Spirituality” will become more prevalent in the media

A “Starbucks Spirituality” will begin to dominate the marketplace of ideas, with individuals picking and choosing religious worldviews that are customized and ‘made to order.’ For example, “Starbucks Spirituality” can be characterized as taking an aspect of Wiccan, adding in a particular tenet from Buddhism and blending it with a few core beliefs of Christianity. A lot of our churches now are having Starbucks put in there churches.

4. Teens will utilize technology in sharing their faith

The use of technology and social networks by Christian teens when sharing their faith will accelerate in 2008. MySpace, Facebook, and YouTube provide extensive exposure for creatively using technology to talk with others about spiritual issues. Blogs and text messaging lend further spontaneous opportunities for teens to communicate the importance of their faith in the midst of their daily lives, whether they are communicating to one friend or an entire network of social relationships.

5. Teens will have a higher economic awareness

Economic realities in 2008 will raise teen’s awareness of economic issues due to the increasing economic stratification of society. Climbing food and energy prices, coupled with the ripple effect of the housing market foreclosure crisis will force parents on the lower end of the economic spectrum to say “no” even more frequently to their teen’s financial requests. Conversely, parents on the high end of the economic spectrum will be unaffected by these economic realities and will continue to spring for high-budget item requests like new cars, next-edition iPhones or the Spring Break trip. As a result, teen cliques will become even more aligned based on the economic standing of their parents.