Toward a Prophetic Youth Ministry: Theory and Praxis in Urban Context

Youth ministries in an urban context are too often left to their own devices. The resources available to them are overwhelmingly conceived, tested and produced exclusively in the suburbs, and bring little to bear on the realities of urban youth culture. As a consequence, youth ministries in large cities have tended to settle onto one of three paths--a traditional paradigm that jealously guards the spiritual formation of its young people, a liberal paradigm that concentrates exclusively on personal growth, and an activist paradigm that galvanizes youth around the social concerns surrounding them. While each of these emphases is important, too often they are pursued to the neglect of the others, and the urban church suffers. Fernando Arzola Jr. proposes a fourth way, a prophetic paradigm that integrates the three and cultivates young people who are spiritually rooted, emotionally mature and responsive to the needs of their community. In this pace-setting book he draws on various disciplines--from biology to sociology, from psychology to theology--to guide urban youth workers into an effective and transformational ministry to youth.