There was once an expert in adolescents, he taught courses, he wrote books, he gave workshops, and made television appearances. His knowledge and understanding of teenagers was unsurpassed. One summer he had remodeled the exterior of his house, re-landscaped and on the afternoon the workers had poured the front walk he came out to survey their work, delighted with the transformation taking place. As he opened the front door he saw a young teen at the end of the walk carving his initials in the drying concrete. The man was furious. He immediately called the police and had the boy arrested. The story made the local news and when the reporter asked why someone of his expertise was not a little more understanding of a young person’s behavior he replied “I like teenagers in the abstract…just not in the concrete.”

It’s not a true story but it does illustrate the point nicely (and with a terrible pun at the end, my favorite) that there are many people who like the IDEA of having young people around, but the reality can be a little messy.

Not too long ago I took a team of our teen staff to help with a confirmation retreat in a nearby diocese. I was startled and disheartened by the attitudes of the adults, three times I was pulled aside by different adults and warned that ‘this year’s group of candidates was the WORST they’d ever taught”. Though the teens were enthusiastic in their participation and clearly had much to give and take from the day, the adults remained grim-faced and critical—scolding anyone who laughed or participated spontaneously. When we came to the point in the day where we talked about living out our faith our teens asked the confirmation candidates about the things they were already doing… are any of you lectors? No hands went up, what about Eucharistic ministers? The kids looked at us funny “You have to be an adult” someone said quietly. As we drove away. our teens wondered aloud why any of the kids would want to come back after confirmation if this is how they were treated.

Working at a place like St Paul’s it’s easy for me to become complacent. This is a community that has learned well (and continues to learn) not only to welcome young people but to let them know their gifts are valued, that they are allowed and expected to make real contributions to the life of our community. That they can serve just as they are, not as miniature adults but with everything that comes with adolescence-with their impertinent questions and their wild imaginations, their idealism and their skepticism.

To all of our teenagers, whether you are involved here or who serve in other arenas of your life, I want to take this opportunity to encourage you with the words of Pope John Paul II “You are not the future of the church. You are the church TODAY”. Discipleship is about THIS moment. Live it now, don’t wait, the world needs you, we need you.

This is a community that has taken seriously our Diocesan guidelines on adolescents and liturgical ministries: “Gifted to Serve” that identifies Baptism as the sacrament from which flows both our call and our right to serve. Young people are invited–and have answered that invitation–to participate. They are lectors, Eucharistic ministers, and sacristans, they participate in music ministry and as acolytes, they lead children’s liturgy of the word and beyond the liturgy they teach in our school of religion and help with Vacation Bible School, coffee & donuts and many other ministries as well. In youth ministry teenagers go through leadership training and are responsible for planning and leading youth group meetings and retreats.

At crossroads we try to live out the call of today’s gospel and reinforce the idea that to be a leader doesn’t mean you have to be the best or the loudest. That God can use all kinds of gifts and the best way to lead is to serve. At a teen staff training a few years ago some of the experienced staff was teaching new staff about their role. One of the senior guys talked about why he came back after his first youth group meeting. “We’d gone into small groups,” he said, “and they started the discussion. as each person took their turn, they all knew each other, everybody listened. Then it got to be my turn,and they listened to me, they didn’t even know me, and they listened. So I came back. You can do that for someone else, you can listen.”

Part of the human condition is ambition, the desire to be recognized and admired by our peers to be bigger and better than anyone has ever been before- to be “the most”, the first, the best. But Jesus says, true greatness comes in letting go of all that human desire and letting yourself be “the least”. Providing well for our families, being at the top our field, making the grade, landing the account, making the team, all of these can be wonderful things but Jesus is telling us, that’s not what makes someone great, he continually chooses the least and holds them up- the hyperbole to show us how things work in God’s understanding- God loves the least and the little, there is nothing we can do or become that would MAKE God love us more. God already loves us infinitely, intimately, and laid down his life to save us from our own ambitions.

We shouldn’t feel too bad for getting it wrong sometimes. Dorothy Day the great founder of the Catholic Worker movement is famous for her quote, “Don’t call me a saint. I don’t want to be dismissed that easily.” She didn’t want anyone to think that the dirty work of caring for the needy was the exclusive realm of “other, more holy” people. She wanted everyone to know how flawed she was so that all people would know that the work of being a disciple was also their work. I think the gospel writers may have had a similar idea with the way they seem to paint the apostles as imbeciles. No sooner has Jesus told the apostles he’s about to die than James and John ask if they can sit next to him at the party.

James and John are with Jesus at the transfiguration, they will be with him in the garden, even they get it wrong. When they ask for a promise of personal glory from Jesus, to be at his right and left, they are not aware that the places on Jesus left and right will be on a cross. Can you drink of the destiny that God has poured out for me?  Jesus asks them. Can you be baptized, overwhelmed, flooded, with the same baptism? Can you desire greatness and yet make yourself the lowest? Can you look despair in the face and dare to see hope? Can you let go of your own selfishness and think of the needs of others? Can you let go of the status, wealth, power and prestige that this world loves so well and embrace the small and the simple and be one with them be one of them? We are also called to drink this cup, we are also baptized with this strange death-into-life baptism.

If the Son of Man serves humanity to the point of death, those of us who follow in his way must also lay down our lives. The greatness of discipleship is measured, not in terms of position in the community or glory in the kingdom, but by the extent to which the disciple resembles Jesus who serves and gives his life.

One of the great themes of Mark’s gospel is how Jesus embraces his own humanity. It also makes the point again and again, there will be suffering on this road. Jesus keeps telling his followers, and us, to go to the most unlikely place, the most unlikely person and let God surprise you with his presence and love. Be like a little child, perhaps even a teenager, a poor man, a blind man, a servant, a slave, let go of everything and in that you will find the kingdom

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