Working with Children & Youth During the Interim Time – Transcript

Jim Latimer
Welcome to Coaching for Interims. We are about empowerment for interim ministers: best practices and quick help from interims for interims – wisdom from the field. I am your host, Jim Latimer, and I have the pleasure of having with me today, Reverend Lynn Carman Bodden. Lynn is a long experienced interim minister and she would like to share some of her wisdom with us today. I’m delighted that she’s willing to do that. So Lynn, in this first segment, what would you like to share with us?

Lynn Carman Bodden
I’d like to talk to people about something I think they might not always consider in the interim, which is how you work with children and youth around transitional issues.

Jim Latimer
Great! You’re on.

Lynn Carman Bodden
Okay. So part of the reason this comes to me is because when I was doing my training, one of the participants in the training – way back in the day in the 90’s – did something about children. And also people who know me through the Interim Ministry Network faculty will know because I always say, “I used to be an elementary school teacher.” So I want to start with a real life story from a church that I served in the Rochester, New York, area where the pastor had left under some difficult circumstances. And one day, I was sitting on the front stairs of the chancel with the children for the children’s story, and a little boy named Noah looked up at me and he said to me, “Pastor Lynn, did pastor Trudy die?” And I thought, wow, these kids do not have any idea what happened to her. I didn’t go into all the ins and outs, but I tried to be very aware of how I dealt with them around issues of change. And then especially when I left, to be very clear with them about why I was leaving and what was going to happen. So I try as a best practice to spend time with children talking about transitional issues, because they go through transitions just like adults do. So it might be, if somebody is going to move, or if their pet dies, or you know, other things that are happening in church, to make them a part of the process. And to teach them from their point of view, or their level, what transition is like and to invite them into conversation.

Jim Latimer
And they’ll get you’re saying. Just because they’re kids doesn’t mean they don’t get transition and change. They do get it, right?

Lynn Carman Bodden
And they experience it. Absolutely. Some of the nicest gifts I’ve gotten when I leave an interim have been from the children saying thank you for what you taught us about change. I think that’s one piece of it. Then there’s another piece that involves youth, who are of course older, and understand things from a more mature level. And so another thing that I always try to do during an interim is to interact with youth. I will be frank with you, youth ministry is not my strong suit. It’s not an area that I focus on, but I think it’s important to consider how the youth are involved in the life of the church. And how will the adults who are dealing with change also involve them? So I always raise the issue, and maybe in some churches this is a no brainer, but it has certainly not been in every church I’ve served: Will there be a youth on the search committee? Are the youth being included in the input that is gathered in the life of the congregation that will serve the search? Lots of people want to say youth are the future of the church. And I like to say youth are the present of the church. And so we need to be mindful of them and gather their input.

Jim Latimer
Can I just pause you here – that specific question: Is it good to have a youth on the settled pastor search committee?

Lynn Carman Bodden
I like to encourage that there will be a youth on the committee. But I also understand that the logistics of that can be complicated, because people might naturally turn to someone who’s a senior in high school or something like that, and that can be complicated if the person goes off to school. A church I served two churches back had a youth on the search committee who was away at college. But now with the technology, it is not as difficult to involve a youth in that process because of zoom and other technologies. And this college student did zoom into meetings, did participate in interviews on zoom, and sometimes did come home to participate.

Jim Latimer
Yes. Because it also depends on – if there is a youth – not only that the youth wants to be on the search committee, but also if the youth is of an appropriate level of maturity and what not to handle this, right? It’s not just, “Oh, we’ve got that demographic checked off for our search committee.”

Lynn Carman Bodden
Exactly. You want someone who’s gonna really offer something to the search committee, and really be able to represent not just a point of view, but be aware of the broader life of the church. And then the other thing that I do is cottage meetings, like a lot of people do, or parlor meetings, or whatever you would call them. And I always try to set aside one that is youth only. So I ask them the same questions. But I ask them to engage those questions. And it’s a good way to meet them, and to hear from them. And to get their point of view, and to try to engage them more actively in this transitional time in the life of the church. And it’s not always a really big group. But I have found it to be a rich contribution to the transitional work.

Jim Latimer
That’s a great way to say that you matter, you youth, young people, you matter. And by I would think by having only youth with this particular cottage meeting it helps with this, because when you mix them with adults – especially older adults – then youth may hold back and not say as much. But if they see they are with peers, they’re probably more likely to really participate and show up. Is that right?

Lynn Carman Bodden
Yes, I hope so. That’s what I always hope for. And I always say, “No parents can be in the meeting.” I’m not so worried about other leaders sitting there to support them, because these cottage meetings often happen, as you know, early on in the process. And so they don’t necessarily know me, and I don’t know them. And so their ability and willingness to participate may be predicated on having somebody there as a bridge person in the room.

Jim Latimer
Good, good. Okay. Well, I think this is probably a good spot to stop here on this segment about working with kids, children and youth during the interim time. And I really appreciated what you said about things you do to include them and to help them see that they matter, and that they’re important, and that they notice a lot of things about change and transition even though we adults aren’t aware that they’re noticing. So just because we’re not aware of it, we still have to bring them along because they, in fact, are noticing and we need to help them understand what’s actually happening.

Lynn Carman Bodden
We want them to be there in the future. So we have to engage them in the present and include them.

Jim Latimer
Well, thank you very much, Lynn, for this. It was great!

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