Covie Weekly Week 7 - Covenant Christian School

Young People - What are they thinking?

Dear parents and carers,

At the recent AGM of the Covenant Association (thank you to the nearly 70 parents who came), the CEO of Christian Education National (CEN) Mr Mark Steyn, gave a superb address as key-note speaker. He unpacked for a us a recent study undertaken through Oxford University of Generation Z.

Mr Steyn spoke of five narratives, which are typically held amongst Generation Z:

1. Divine Disillusionment – this features distrust of institutions, hypocrisy and performative leadership. Spiritual openness remains, but authority is questioned. They are asking if Christianity is real.

2. The Space Between – those living between scepticism and spiritual longing. They have deep questions around meaning, integrity and purpose and curiosity about transcendence, without certainty or commitment.

3. Self Help – where spirituality is shaped by wellness, therapy and self-improvement. Influencers replace traditional spiritual mentors. They are deeply emotionally aware, but under nourished spiritually.

4. Lost and Found – those longing for belonging, connection and community. Authentic people and communities often become catalysts for faith. In this age of endless connection, many young people are starving for communion.

5. Simple Faith – those who are attracted to sincere, grounded, uncomplicated faith, who have a desire for spiritual reality rather than religious performance. The deepest hunger of this generation may not be for relevance, but for reality.

Christian education, he said, matters more now than ever. It provides hope, community, wisdom, and a place to belong. Our responsibility is the formation of hearts, loves, worship and hope. This generation is still open to wonder - they are spiritually searching - will Christian education meet that search, he asked?

At Covenant, it is our desire to ensure our Christian education offerings are robust, meaningful, winsome and relevant.

Late in the 20^th century, American sociologist, Prof Christian Smith, developed a way of understanding Christian faith which was so truncated and hollowed out, it ceased to be authentic Christian faith and remained a reductionist husk. He described this reductionist position as MTD (Moralistic, Therapeutic Deism). By this he meant young people who were in and around Christian groups and gave the appearance of being Christian but were not in fact so on any rigorous definition. Rather, he described them as moralists, by which he meant that they thought that good enough was in fact good enough, that is, that good works will satisfy God without the need for Jesus. They were, he said, therapeutic in their understanding of God; God’s role was to keep them happy and avoid stress or trouble. They were deists, that is, rather than adhering to the God of the Bible, their image of God was of a distant deity who could be called on in times of trouble, yet otherwise be largely ignored. Prof Smith’s message called for clarity in gospel presentation and a deep knowledge of young people in one’s sphere of influence and in where they stood. This takes a stance on the uniqueness of Jesus, who said “I am the way the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me”. John 14:6.

I am confident that the level of real Christian faith amongst our students is far higher than in the average school. This confidence is because there is an overlying alignment at Covenant between the Christian faith taught in the homes and churches of our Covenant community and advocated by the school. Nonetheless, it is helpful to understand the cultural narrative relating to faith in current generation undergoing schooling. The schemas presented by Mr Steyn and Prof Smith are helpful windows into the thinking of young people in Australia.

Regards,

Dr John Collier

Interim Principal