Introduction:
Asia is home to about 60% of the world’s young people. At St. Therese Church they seem to be an INVISIBLE reality.
Convention:
During the three days we spent at Mundelein (May 24th-27th 2007) Chinese Youth were very active, visible, and joyful. With their songs, suggestions, and participation into our discussions, they became the focus of the whole Convention and its propelling engine.
Thematic talks, sharing in groups and testimonies dealt with different areas of faith and experience to help us to get an insight into how Chinese Youth could become signs of hope of joy to their peers and in the Church.
The main idea which run through these days was: young people can, and must, play an important role in family-society-church here in North America.
The celebration of the Eucharist reminded us of the importance of living the ”Paschal mystery” daily to become the evangelical yeast in our faith-communities.
Insights:
Family is a sanctuary of life. Chinese parents make a lot of sacrifices to provide for their children’s welfare and education, perceived as a gate-way to success in life.
Families hold a very important place in Asian cultures. Family values like filial respect, love and care for the aged, the weak, love for children and harmony are held in high esteem in all Asian cultures and religious traditions.
In urban areas, families do not seem to have prime-time to spend together, to communicate and to care for each other today.
Forgetting the presence of God in their lives, youth can experience much loneliness and hopelessness during family crises.
A family must be united in their relationships and rooted in prayer.
The factor that most differentiates one Chinese American youth from another is the youth’s parents. The children of the parents who came to the US on a student visa to study will significantly differ from the children of the undocumented worker and live in an inner city ghetto.
The more affluent leave for the suburbs with their oversized houses, large green lawns and academy-like public schools, the poor are left behind in the cities.
Chinese
Youth
Chinese American urban Youth are a diverse mix of cultural influences, and could be divided into three main groups:
1. Those heavily influenced by urban styles and urban problems. They tend to underachieve in school, to spend a lot of time outside of their homes and without parental supervision. Some of them are members of gangs.
Risks for these teens include: drugs, violence, sexual experimentation and
Under-achievement. Most urban Chinese teens are influenced by this type of
social example, even if they do not completely ascribe to this style.
2. Those who are recent immigrants or whose families retain a very Chinese style of life. These Youth prefer to speak Chinese. They often have to work hard to support their parents’ business. They are significantly at risk for academic underachievement, especially if they never master the English language. These Youth project a certain “foreignness” about themselves.
3. They are influenced by hip-hop and by Chinese culture, but they are free enough to dialogue critically with these cultures out of a healthy sense of self.
* Urban Chinese Catholic youth ministry must reach all three groups of Youth and it seems very much unlikely that these three groups of Youth can be served by the same programs. The very urban kids may be seen as bad influences and unwholesome by the other Youth and most especially by their parents.
* There are two basic types of Chinese Catholic youth ministry models available:
1. It starts in the church with Catholic children of church members. While occasionally some Catholic Youth may get their non-Catholic friends involved, the youth ministry is primarily a service offered for Catholic families. It is a catechetical ministry , that is meant to offer faith formation for Catholics
2. It begins with the neighborhood and its predominant target is non-Catholics. Catholics Youth may even feel odd or unusual in this group. Here we tend to serve poor inner city Youth without regard to whether or not they are likely to convert.
(From Xaverian News)