Copyright © Center for Ministry Development, 2003. All rights reserved. www.CMDnet.org Effective Youth Ministry Practices and Models By Tom East Where would you start in trying to describe youth ministry in a parish? Youth ministry is more than just the gatherings, activities, and events. It’s more than the leadership team. It’s more than the newsletter or fliers. How do you describe a relationship? Imagine describing your most significant relationship only in terms of what you do or when you get together. It’s pretty awkward, isn’t it? Youth Ministry is more than a program; it’s a relationship between the parish and its young members. Like a relationship, youth ministry has many dimensions. At its heart, there is a pattern of listening, caring, responding and sharing. When choosing a model for your parish youth ministry, you are choosing a way to put all of your resources together to build this relationship. Resources help you with lots of the elements that will go into your model, but each parish will find a different way to put the pieces together. Parishes with Effective Youth Ministry Youth, adult youth ministry leaders, and parish staff members described their experience of youth ministry as a “web of relationships.” Youth ministry nurtures these relationships between youth and their peers, youth and their families, youth and the youth ministry leaders, and youth with the parish community. This was just one image among many that surfaced in interviews conducted as part of a research project of the Center for Ministry Development and Saint Mary’s Press. “The Effective Youth Ministry Practices in Catholic Parishes” project included interviews with nearly 400 youth, adult leaders, and parish staff members from 96 parishes from around the country. These parishes were implementing a vision for comprehensive youth ministry, but they were responding with different models for their different settings. The results of this project reveal important considerations when choosing a model for youth ministry. Parishes with effective youth ministry had these characteristics.  Youth ministry is supported and understood by the parish community. In these parishes, youth felt valued and welcomed in their parish, and they felt included in parish life. Everything youth experience in the parish is part of their experience of youth ministry. This means that to be effective we pay attention to Sunday liturgies as well as we do to Wednesday night youth gatherings.