To live and die for

We have failed to capture their hearts and their imaginations. We have failed to give them a reason to live, a cause to give their lives to. We have failed to show them something so important, that it’s worth dying for.

In place of training them, we have entertained them. We have told the God wants to use them, but have given them nothing to do.

When you look in your eyes, there is no fire, there is no life. Life to them is four hours in front of the computer chatting with their friends. But, they have nothing that burns in them, that makes them get out of bed in the morning, that drives them. They have nothing to live for, much less to die for.

We told them God wanted to use them then shut them up in buildings to spend nights singing and dancing yet all the while the world outside is starving, dying of AIDS and going to hell. Is this what it means that God “wants to use them”? Isn’t there anything more?

Every generation needs a flag to wave, a cause to embrace, something to give their lives for, but somewhere along the way, just Jesus and Salvation didn’t seem enough. Just reaching the unreached seemed menial, so we tried to create more exciting projects that in the end did nothing more than occupy their time and make them think that they were doing something when all along they were accomplishing nothing. Yet, no one was fooled and still there remains a generation trying to find itself and discover its purpose.

Instead of challenging the way they live and their values, we changed the structure to suit them. But before long, our empty structure didn’t satisfy them and we, rather than challenge them, accommodated them and ended up frustrating and losing them.

Lazy, uninterested and unproductive are terms that can be readily used to describe this once hopeful generation. But why? Because we haven’t given them anything to do. And let’s face it, waiting stinks. It’s now or never. We challenge them now, we train them now, we invest in them now, or we lose them forever.

70’s peace

The X Generation is made up of Slackers, Hackers (a.k.a.

Phreakers, Cyberpunks, and Neuronauts), and New Jackers, those

ever-disposable urban youth prophets of Hiphoprisy. We are Ravers and Atari

Wavers, Stuck-in-the-70s-ers, and Particle Men, zooming to and fro without

a place to go. According to most demographers, we are more street smart and

pop-culture literate, and less versed in the classics, ethics, and formal

education (especially in areas like geography, civics, and history: areas

where we appear to be, in short, an academic disgrace.) Many of us do not

read, do not vote, and make sure not to care. Polls show us to be greater

risk-takers, more likely to do things that would result in self-harm, and

more materialistic than our predecessors, the Boomers. We are said to have

less ambition, less idealism, less morals, smaller attention spans, and

less discipline than any previous generation of this century. We are the

most aborted, most incarcerated, most suicidal, and most uncontrollable,

unwanted, and unpredictable generation in history. (Or so claim the authors

of 13th Generation.)

The good news is that we are a generation that believes

little in talk and much in action. We shun ideology and dogma for a basic

pragmatism in all areas of life.

We despise the "retrohippies" and New Agers of our time -

bot for holding up strong ideals, but for never living up to them. We are

partisans of the New Edge - willing to explore new places, transcend old

boundaries, and think bigger than anyone else.

I think we're in an age where someone goes,

I want to hear someone talk to me instead

of trying to sell me something

-- Henry Rollins

They want to be missionaries, so we teach them a few skits, paint their faces and take them to the nearest park so they can completely humiliate themselves and never speak of missions again. By the way, was that missions? And while we are at it, can we please stop calling those who stay in their own countries and many times in their own cities missionaries? Can we please stop calling them things that they are not in some absurd attempt to convince them that are really doing something monumental when they don’t even think so? This is psychiatry gone loony.

A missionary is traditionally defined as a propagator of HYPERLINK "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion" \o "Religion" religion who works to convert those outside that community. The word "missionary" is derived from Latin missio 'sending', the equivalent of the Greek-derived word HYPERLINK "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apostle" \o "Apostle" apostle "messenger". Interestingly enough, many pseudo miussionaries of today don’t really go anywhere or do anything and for that matter impact anythiong more than the local pigeons that they ran off oin order to do their “mission outreach”. They don’t preach, they don’t convert, they don’t teach, they aren’t missionaries. They are youth wanting to be somebody doing someting and not knowing where to turn. So, we encourage them to join the local, I don’t know what to do with my life, don’t want to study and certainly don’t want to work, missionary organization so they can spend the next few years trying to convince people to give them money in order to continue doing what they really aren’t doing.

We tell them that they can change the world and they don’t even know where to start with their own lives.