“Media Psychology” with Angela Patterson

Show Notes:

No matter what your age is, you’re probably caught up in the 24-hour news cycle, the internet, social media, and doom scrolling. You probably spend a lot of your day with a screen in front of you, and that affects us socially, emotionally, and mentally. Today’s guest gives Eddie and Chris some insight into what the church can offer in our media-saturated world.

Dr. Angela Patterson is media psychologist, writer, and researcher with Springtide Research Institute, nonpartisan nonprofit organization. She earned her doctorate in media psychology from Fielding, where she focused on how media and technology affect cultural institutions. Her research centers on the impact of digital media in adolescents and young adults, especially in regards to religious and spiritual development. Her work with Springtide Research focuses on 13- to 25-year-olds, to give them a voice and to help others learn from them and serve them as we all figure out what’s next.

Resources:

Dr. Angela Patterson’s website

Follow her on Instagram

Springtide Research Institute’s website

Follow Springtide on Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube

Transcript:

Eddie Rester 00:01

I'm Chris McAlilly. And I'm Eddie Rester. Welcome to The Weight. today. Our guest is Dr. Angela Patterson. She's a media psychologist. She specializes in technology's effects on religious and spiritual development. She's a part of the Springtide Research Institute, and she does a lot of work on her own as a speaker and a writer. And we had an amazing conversation with her today. Chris, what were your takeaways today? What did you hear?

Chris McAlilly 00:26

I come into the conversation, both as a pastor, but also as a father. And so my oldest is 12. And so I'm beginning to think through all right, we're about to enter into middle school and begin this journey that she really has laid out a fair amount of social scientific research about. The goal would be to kind of come alongside a young person, either as a parent or as someone who works with young people in religious spaces or in educational spaces, to give them what they need to flourish. And so that really was kind of the frame for our conversation today. And I think the thing that I will continue to wrestle with is this idea of a flattening of the authorities that kids interface with. When I was growing up, there were more stable, slightly more stable, kind of authorities that were there. And now there's less. There's a kind of flattening of that and the need for guides to navigate the range of things that young people engage, both online or not. That's one thing that comes to mind. What about you?

Eddie Rester 01:41

You know, thinking about the authority, I mean, when I was growing up my authorities were my scoutmaster... I had this list of folks who were in the authorities in my life. When you talk about flattening the authorities, that means that today, a scoutmaster and an influencer on Tik Tok might have the same level of authority in someone's life. And that's a very different world. And one of the most encouraging things for me is that she sees a role for the church, when the church is at its best to really impact the lives of kids who are growing up in this media- saturated world, this media-saturated life that they have. We can't undo that. We can't unring that bell. So how do we, as the church, provide space for them? And for me, that was the most encouraging thing. Because if you look at the stats, if you look at the numbers, you'll weep if you're a part of the church, because it is so demoralizing with Gen Z and their interaction with the church. But she, I think, talks about what it is that we can offer well.

Chris McAlilly 02:46

Yeah, so one of the things that can be offered well is intergenerational, in-person community, deliberate, organic community. I also found it encouraging that she said that their research is that young people experience the sacred. They experienced the Holy, the divine. She described it as moments, nonlinear moment, these moments where it's like, wow, I really feel connected to a higher power. I really feel connected to other people. Most recently, I think we saw this play out around the solar eclipse. That was a moment where I feel like there was almost like this spiritual yearning, this yearning to be a part of something greater that happened on a kind of a national scale. And I think when those kinds of things happen, you know that one of the things I was left thinking about is how to connect the dots from these moments into a journey that can be navigated. And, you know, she also gives a language around, not just being an authority, or just assuming people are going to engage, but rather being a guide, who may be a couple... You know, I just think that that image. I'll continue to think about that, guides for navigating the spiritual path, the sacred path. That's kind of the role of the church today, it seems, and that's not a terrible place to be in. And I think there's a lot of good work to be done over the next decade, two decades, three decades.

Eddie Rester 04:23 Absolutely.

Chris McAlilly 04:23
That I think could reinvigorate the life of a faith for young people today. So it's good conversation, Eddie. Thanks for being here for it.

Eddie Rester 04:32

Enjoyed it. Yeah. And thankful for all who are listening. Make sure you share, particularly if you've got parents or church leaders, share this episode with them. Leave us review, send us a note. We'd love to hear from you.

Chris McAlilly 04:43

[INTRO] The truth is the world is growing more angry, more bitter, and more cynical. People don't trust one another. And we feel disconnected.

Eddie Rester 04:55

The way forward is not more tribalism. It's more curiosity that challenges what we believe, how we live, and how we treat one another. It's more conversation that inspires wisdom, healing, and hope.

Chris McAlilly 05:07

So we launched The Weight podcast as a space to cultivate sacred conversations with a wide range of voices at the intersection of culture and theology, art and technology, science and mental health. And we want you to be a part of it.

Eddie Rester 05:22

Join us each week for the next conversation on The Weight. [END INTRO] We're here today with Dr. Angela Patterson. She is a writer and a researcher. She is a media psychologist. She's going to tell us what that is in just a minute. But Angela, thank you for spending some time with us today.

Angela Patterson 05:42 Absolutely. I'm glad to be here.

Eddie Rester 05:45
So media psychologist. Tell us about that. People may be familiar with someone who's in media or psychology. What is that? And how does that play into the work that you do?

Angela Patterson 05:57

So it's interesting, because, as of 10 years ago, I didn't know what media psychology was. I stumbled on it like many people do. And essentially what it is, is this study of how media and technology interact with our psychological development. So as media psychologists, we believe that you come to media with all of your stuff: your background, anything that you've experienced, your cultural context, all of that. And then you meet media, as a tool, as an entity. And then you come through on the other side with a positive, negative, or neutral impact. And what media psychologists are interested in is that impact that happens. So oftentimes, and you know, the industry is a little split on this, but I would venture to guess that most of us would argue that media and technology itself don't cause anything. It's that precarious mix of what we bring to the media, and what media can produce in us on the other side, that causes some of these negative outcomes and the positive outcomes that we hear so much about on the news and and other places.

Eddie Rester 07:19

It's such an important topic right now, and particularly your arena of research, you do research with 13- to 25-year-olds. And that's a group that unlike, you know, my generation, I'm 53. And I won't say how old Chris is, but he's a little younger than me. But you know, we interacted a little bit with media, but we didn't really have it all. Well, we didn't have phones. We couldn't interact on phones. So this is a pretty significant topic for us right now, and for the church as well. Tell us a little bit, you work with the Springtide Research Center. So tell us a little bit about Springtide's work and how people might connect to that.

Angela Patterson 07:59

So Springtide Research Institute is a really cool niche of the world. We are a nonprofit, nonpartisan research institute that uses social science to understand how people 13 to 25 make meaning in various ways. Oftentimes, that is focused on religion and spirituality. But we also look at how religion and spirituality intersects with other cultural entities. We've done work on the intersection of faith and mental health, the intersection of faith and the uncertainty from COVID. We're working on faith in politics right now for 2024 and understanding how young people are seeing the political landscape in light of their religious and spiritual leanings. And it's important to note that we study young people of all faiths, no faiths. Everyone is fair game, because we're looking at this work from a social science perspective and not a theological one. So it's a different approach in how we're thinking about how young people are thinking about God and belief and community and some of the things that we so commonly talk about in the church space.

Chris McAlilly 09:22
What are two or three things that you've noticed in your research recently?

Angela Patterson 09:28

Whew. So many. So our 2023 report was on sacred experience, and how young people experience the sacred. And we were really curious about this in the beginning, because we see over time, and Springtide is entering its fifth year of existence, maybe. We're still very young. But we do notice that over time, more and more of the young people that we talked to don't have any religious or spiritual background. Their parents didn't grow up that way. Or maybe their parents did, but they didn't raise them in any one faith tradition, or with any belief system. And so we were curious to understand how did they understand what is sacred? Is anything sacred? Does that word even mean anything to them? Does that concept mean anything? So we spent a year diving into what exactly that meant. And we found that young people experience the sacred in the ways that you would think that they do, if you apply the church lens, if you apply the Christian theological lens. We have a language for that. But regardless of whether a young person has that framework or not, they're still experiencing the sacred. It's just not necessarily in these traditional environments. They're experiencing the sacred in moments. And so these are special moments that we claim are extraordinary, personal, and relational. So not unlike what we understand to be the sacred when they might not be using the language. But when they're describing what's happening to them, these are the things that come up: "I feel a sense of awe." "I feel closer to a higher power." "I feel closer to my neighbor, friend, parent." "I feel a greater sense of purpose or alignment." These sorts of things routinely came up. And so it's important to know that regardless of religious framework, or lack thereof, these young people have tremendous capacity to still experience the sacred. And adults have the ability to help them cultivate what that sacred experience. We can't reproduce it. That was very clear in our work. These are snowflake type events. No one is necessarily the same, because it's often kind of a complex of many things coming together in one moment, not unlike what we know as sacred moments. But adults can absolutely help young people cultivate a way of seeing the world in which the sacred appears more often, or at the very least they have language to describe what is happening.

Chris McAlilly 12:25

Yeah, that's interesting. What I hear you saying is that it's possible to cultivate attention in a particular kind of way that allows you to perceive phenomena that you may be encountering as a young person, by way of categories that would include the sacred. Something that's like, "Man, this is great!" And then you need a language for the greatness of it. And yeah, I do think that's where faith traditions do have language and concepts and constructs for thinking about, alright, this is a moment here on a mountain, with these rocks and these people and wow, there's the sunset. And all the sudden, it's like, man, maybe this is something that we need to remember. And that memory can then become something that can be held on to in times of trial or adversity or whatever. And then maybe that can give you hope, especially when things get really hard, you know. And maybe that's different than watching TikTok all day, you know.

Angela Patterson 13:25
But then the sacred moment can still pop up on TikTok.

Chris McAlilly 13:29
Well, you're gonna have to describe...

Angela Patterson 13:30 If you have the right stuff.

Chris McAlilly 13:32
This is where, I think, Angela, you're gonna need to do a little generational translation for Eddie because Eddie doesn't know about TikTok.

Eddie Rester 13:38 Oh, gosh.

Chris McAlilly 13:39
Actually, I'm kidding. Eddie is on TikTok far more than I am.

Eddie Rester 13:43
Yeah, my daughters, during COVID, kept saying, "I saw this video on TikTok. I just saw it. Did you see the video on TikTok?" And so yeah, I'm there.

Chris McAlilly 13:53
Eddie, do you experience? No, no, I have to ask the question. I have to ask you a question. Angela, I apologize. Eddie, have you...

Angela Patterson 14:00 No, it's okay!

Chris McAlilly 14:01
Have you ever experienced sacred moments in your scrolling of TikTok, Eddie?

Eddie Rester 14:06

I don't know that I've experienced sacred moments watching TikTok. The algorithm for me throws me funny stuff and religious stuff. So I don't know if that's, I'm just on the wrong algorithm, I guess, for that.

Chris McAlilly 14:18

So before you shift, I want to know, Angela, for somebody, like I have a hard time imagining a young person having a sacred experience using TikTok. Help me understand that. Just give me an example.

Angela Patterson 14:31

So it's interesting, because when we ask young people about sacred experience online, in general, that can be social media, that can be the internet, many things right? Some are like, yeah, it can't happen there. That's no. There's elements of it that need to be not mediated for that to happen. Another case, they absolutely can't happen. And usually what it boiled down to was that they felt some sort of connection to another person or to something higher in the moment. And so if you are watching maybe a friend or maybe a favorite influencer, somebody that you regard as an authority on something that you care about, and they're talking about something that's really important to you, it could be totally possible to have a sacred moment if they really say something that touches you, or that meets a need that perhaps you've been working on that sort of stuff.

Chris McAlilly 15:27 That makes sense.

Eddie Rester 15:28 Yeah.

Angela Patterson 15:28

Yeah. No, no. I mean, that's why the church is so uniquely positioned to be really good at this, because we do have a blueprint for it. And it's a large one, and it's a historical one. And there's many ways that we can tailor it to the needs and wants and desires of modern day folks. It's interesting, when we look at how young people are negotiating their faith life, it's much more nonlinear than any of us have.

Eddie Rester 15:29

Yeah. You know, I was just thinking that going back even to a story in scripture, where Paul is pointing to, you know, Hey, there's this temple to an unknown god over here. Let me help you understand and frame that. So when you're talking about people of belief, helping the younger generation frame something, Paul was doing that way back. I really think that that's when the church has been at its best. That's what the church has helped people do is say, here's how you can think about... Am I off track there, Angela? Is that... Say what you mean by nonlinear. Help us understand that word.

Angela Patterson 16:42

Yeah, absolutely. So when I say nonlinear, many of us were born into a faith tradition. And we've lived it out until either we doubled down on it, or we pick something else, or we opted out entirely. It was much more of a, I'm here, and then I'm not there. Or I just stay the course. Young people today, even those who maybe are born into a religious or spiritual framework, feel way more comfortable trying on other religions other faith traditions, other ideas, other dogmas, to help them make sense of the questions, especially the big questions that they have. They are seekers in the truest sense. And so where ours might have been more linear, theirs might be more of a zigzag and bouncing around. That does not mean that they won't land somewhere.

Angela Patterson 17:36

They will, and some of them choose to have something that's maybe a little bit more hybrid than we're used to. But this is an important period of exploration. And now there's so many ways to get information, that the church is really uniquely positioned to be a guide. I won't say an authority, because that doesn't always resonate with young people of this particular generation. But they do care very much about someone who is authentic, and has great knowledge on a subject, and is willing to be in dialogue with them, and share those understandings

Chris McAlilly 18:22

That's so helpful to think about, because I do think that one of the things that I notice about the internet, you know, really over the course of my ministry. So I've been in ministry for 15 years. And I think about my own experience as an adolescent, and how I came up. You know, aol.com was a new thing when I was like, 12. And so, you know, over the course of that time, one of the things that the internet does as a communication technology is there's a flattening of things. So there's more information available. It's more widely available, and some of the traditional forms of authority are breaking down both institutionally... I mean, we're, I think we're comfortable. This is widely talked about as it relates to the news media. I do think it's also the case in terms of what are viewed as religious or spiritual authorities. So then you're hearing a lot of voices, and especially if you're exploring spiritual things, or kind of exploring the sacred or the divine vis-Ã -vis these existential questions, you have an opportunity to... It can be very confusing. I mean, there's so much information. There's so many different sacred paths, and to have someone to say, "You know what, here's one that's pretty awesome, that I've walked down before," and maybe you could try that one. And that one actually leads to more positive mental health outcomes. And there's a rhythm here where you can actually get some rest, you know, and there's a rhythm here that actually could make you maybe slightly more happy than just sad all the time, or whatever. And that kind of dialogue I think can be very helpful. I think the other thing that I've heard you say, Eddie, is just--because I'm also the parent of a 12-year-old.

Angela Patterson 20:14 Okay. Yeah.

Chris McAlilly 20:15

And so I'm experiencing this not just in the rearview mirror, but I'm looking forward to what's ahead and scared, is just being entrusting your children to God in the midst of a crazy, labyrinthine kind of internet world. I will say I'm not there to the point of just trust that it's all gonna work out because I'm a little bit afraid that it won't be. But Eddie, you've reminded me from time to time, and other parents, just entrust your kids to the Lord. I don't know. I said a lot of words. What do you guys hear in all of that? Right.

Eddie Rester 20:48

Angela, I guess out of that, as you think about the work of the church right now. And you know, people are scared if the church... The church is going to exist. God will bring the renewal that needs to come. But if a church is, if somebody from a local church is listening and saying, "Gosh, I'd love for us to be that place that can help young adults began to see more clearly what the sacred really is." What would you say to that church leader? To say, "think of your work this way, and maybe think of your work not that way." I think it's also important at times for the church to let go of some things if they're going to head in a new direction.

Angela Patterson 21:31

So one way I've thought about this is, how might a church leader and a church congregation lean more deeply into vulnerability? Just what Chris was talking about in terms of, "hey, I have, here's a faith tradition that I'm familiar with. This is my path." And "here's actually the struggle that I've had on that path. Here's where I almost opted out of said path." Some of these tension points that we all experience on our faith journeys are incredibly important for young people to understand as they engage in this type of exploration. So rather than the church coming forward, saying, "here's this great thing, and we're going to sell it to you. We're going to convince you that it is the path that is the way," as much as we might believe that, how might you take an accompaniment standpoint and say, "we understand that you have questions, and this particular faith tradition provides some answers, some we're still trying to figure out. We're happy to walk alongside you as you figure this out. We do have some expertise and some knowledge you might be interested in. And we're not afraid of the questions that might come. Because we're not afraid to say we don't know."

Eddie Rester 23:06

Yeah. And I think that's hard for churches built from the 1950s, 60s, 70s, 80s. Because I think back at how long the 80s were. Because it was you put the good news out there. And people would say yes.

Angela Patterson 23:22 They just say yes.

Eddie Rester 23:23

They just say yes. They wouldn't ask a lot of questions. They go well, that's what everybody else thinks. But that's not the world we're in now. And so that vulnerability of saying, "I'm going to walk with you in this one, I don't know." I think about CS Lewis and JRR Tolkien. Tolkien was the established Christian and CS Lewis coming out of World War One and all the horrors of World War One just absolutely... And what happened to his mom. His mom died of cancer when he's young, all part of his story, and he just absolutely rejected everything about faith. But it was Tolkien who was willing to walk with him outside the bounds of the church, really. And say, yeah, let's just talk about it. And they would have late night debates. And, you know, I think we're trapped in that mindset of, well, if they're just not going to show up and do what we want them to do in response, I think sometimes the church is like, well, there's just... We give up on the generation too quickly.

Angela Patterson 24:22

Right. And that's an unfair position, because this movement and shift away from that kind of total authority that you are referring to and that Chris was talking about, that's been happening for decades now. The internet did not cause that.

Eddie Rester 24:36 Yes. Correct.

Angela Patterson 24:38

Now might it have accelerated? Perhaps. But that is something that has been happening for some time now. And so this idea that we're going to go back to this church, the model that we are very familiar with from the 50s and 60s... The world is different today. And the young people in it are very different today. So how might the church be able to come alongside and say, "I know that you're navigating a lot of things, not just faith related ones. How might I be able to be an accompaniment to you just in figuring out life period?" Because our research shows that young people will really sign on. I mean, this is for any organization, not just a church. They will really sign on for you, if they feel like they belong there. We call it belonging precedes believing. And so if you invest in the time it takes to cultivate a real meaningful relationship with somebody, and we know that can take significant time, they're much more likely to engage in whatever kind of doctrine or faith tradition or rituals or whatever these other things that you would so much like them to participate in. There's some proceeding steps that need to happen before they really feel safe enough to dive into that.

Chris McAlilly 26:08

I wonder that on the point of belonging, and some of the things, some of the preceding steps that would precede maybe engagement, active engagement, in a faith tradition... What are some of the things that you guys find lead to deeper senses of belonging for young people?

Angela Patterson 26:29

Absolutely. So what our work shows around belonging is that there's distinct patterns of increased sense of belonging, and they kind of stair step. But I think in reality, they're kind of all happening simultaneously, depending on what your level of acquaintance is with that young person. So we say that these intervals are noticed, named, and known. And with each of those steps, one experiences an increased sense of belonging. So notice is just what it sounds like. We noticed that you walked through the doors on Sunday. We noticed that you weren't there on Wednesday night, or whatever the thing is. They know that my presence is in the building. And it is missed when it is not. They know... Well, I would say that they know their names, but that's kind of the next step. It's not just we know your name, but it's, we know things about you, even surface things. It's just that next step of getting to know somebody. We've all done this process. And how might we be intentional about making sure not only do we know a young person's name, but something about their lives that signals interest. And then known is the more complex layer of relationship in which there's been some level of trust established, and that there's been some meaningful interaction where both parties have shared appropriately about themselves. And we're starting to build a different level of rapport, one in which I might be able to tell you something, and I don't receive it as pressure, rejection, abandonment, all of these things that can come up in a church setting, because we have already built a rapport. And so therefore, I can take different types of dialogue from you. But that's a process that happens over time in any relationship. The same tracks here.

Eddie Rester 28:26

I'm sitting here thinking about, you know, the generation that has grown up, and Jonathan Haidt, we mentioned that before we got on, talked about the anxious generation, that so much of their interaction with the world--and COVID was a part of this--is through screens. It's Zoom meetings, Zoom classes. They see heroes through TikTok or influencers through Instagram, you know, they FaceTime their friends. So there's this distance in relationship that the screen creates. And there are a lot of, as you talked about, going through media, what happens on the other side, one of the things that he's done, I'm sure your media has shown, your research has shown as well, is that a lot of that interaction through media comes out on the other side with mental health struggles and other things that are amplified through that. But what you just described is actually the church coming through the screen and saying, "You are a person and we're going to do this in the flesh," which is very different. And one of the things that you said before we started recording today was, this is the gift that the church can give, not just to segregate, we're gonna put these kids in a room off by themselves, because they know, they like each other. But the gift is this multi-generational enfleshment of relationship. Say a little bit more about how important that is, and that gift that maybe people in the church who think, "I can't, I don't know how to swipe a TikTok," what that can mean.

Angela Patterson 30:30

So that... Well, the young people already know how to swipe a TikTok. They don't need you for that. They need you for a whole bunch of other stuff that don't know how to navigate or are having trouble navigating. And that's where the church is so beautifully positioned, because as you mentioned, it is one of the last spaces where it is truly intergenerational. You know, we don't necessarily always come from communal home and family structures. At school, you know, it's segregated by grade, right, so we're not necessarily experiencing that outside of a student-teacher relationship. The church really is one of the last places where you can interface on a regular basis with people from multiple generations. And young people crave that sort of meaningful connection, because to your point, yes, a lot of what they experience is mediated. So what could it look like in person, or even if it was still mediated, just having a structure in which people are dedicated to your well being and helping you flourish? That's what churches are designed to do for all people. And so they're uniquely positioned to do it here. You know, one of the things that I personally believe, as a media psychologist, and I think that there would be several other psychologists of all sorts, to back me up on this, is we feel like so many young people are having these experiences online, and it's really contributing and amplifying these mental health conditions. Right? And some of that is true for some young people, right? I think the way to mitigate that, again, is to take steps back and look at what is the in-person environment that that young person is experiencing? If we can shore up their sense of belonging and connection in their home environments, in their school environments, clubs, churches...

Eddie Rester 32:10 Right.

Angela Patterson 32:39

Community, all of these things, then yes, when they come to media, might they still experience negative health, mental health outcomes? Sure. Are they less likely to? Absolutely. Right? So the church, again, is also part of this important work of shoring up young people in community, wo we don't experience or maybe experience less of these negative outcomes that we continue to see.

Eddie Rester 32:39

Community. One of the things that Jonathan Haidt--I keep coming back to him. I've listened to several podcasts. I haven't read the book, I want to be honest about that, "The Anxious Generation,"--but listened to several podcasts. And he just really comes back to the thing that you were just talking about: these real-time, in real life spaces for our kids. And one of the things he said in the podcast was, "We got over-protective with the real world and not protective enough with the digital world. We kept our kids inside. We managed when and how they could go to the playground. We didn't let them talk to adults in the real world." All those things, which we were trying to protect them, but we then distanced them from the world. And that's created deep, I think, a deep need in our kids today to be in contact. One quick story, I'm gonna throw it over to Chris. My oldest daughter graduated from college, went to work for a company 12 hours away from her mama and dad. That company, what they did on the onboarding, they would bring in three or four hundred young adults at a time to work. You werein a cohort. You were given options to interact. They became this in-real-life thing so that these young adults, who had struggled through screens growing up, didn't come to go to work and go home.

Angela Patterson 34:33 Right.

Eddie Rester 34:33
But they were almost, I wouldn't say forced, I wouldn't tell my daughter she was forced into it, but kind of pushed into this setting where real people became real life for her. So I think what but kind of pushed into this setting where real people became real life for her. So I think what you're saying is actually right, and I'm going to stop talking so Chris can kick back in.

Chris McAlilly 34:52

No, I think that's great. I mean, I think... I appreciate the encouragement, Angela, to kind of own the things within the context of the church that the church has historically been good at. And just kind of recognizing that and owning that that's a strength, that building intergenerational, in-person community has been the whole. That is what worship is, like, that's what it is. And so one of the things that we've... Eddie and I worked together for a number of years, and we worked on a building campaign together, and part of the campaign was to create a gathering space. And that's what I'm thinking about as we're talking. It's just the power of that space. It's the space, in the 15 minutes before and the 15 minutes after worship. And I think that's... I mean, it's becoming the magic of Sunday morning at our church, is that space for those. They're not deep interactions, exactly. But there's a vibe and a spirit of the conversation there where people can interact and kids can run around, and it's just human community. But I think just recognizing the power of that and the importance of it, I think, is what I hear.

Angela Patterson 36:14

Oh, absolutely. I mean, and I think being deliberate about creating organic community, it sounds like an oxymoron. But it's, it's true. You know, we create the environment, and then we just kind of have to let things unfold, and be intentional about continuing to hold that space over and over again. And one thing that churches could look at, in addition to creating that sort of community in that sort of intentional space, is to ask, "How am I involving young people in the life of the church, outside of children and youth ministry?" If that wasn't a thing, then how might young people be able to have opportunities to serve, grow their talents, contribute to larger issues within the church? You know, the United Methodist Church has had some that they've been working to overcome. General Conference has made some strides in that just recently. But I wonder how many churches went and asked their youth about those issues, about LGBTQ inclusion, and what diversity inclusion means, and how were they used as a way to shore up the church's--little church--position on this bigger issue? I mean, that's just one kind of case in point. But there's lots of ways that we can help young people to grow as they're contributing at the same time. And when they feel that sense of ownership, then now we're having a different kind of conversation, a different kind of relationship, because now they know, "oh, no, the adults saw something in me, and they tap me to read scripture in worship, or to sing in the choir, or maybe to help with the smaller kids," or whatever the thing is. So that's one way to enter into this with the young people that are already in your care, is how are you looking at them as viable members of the church? And is there ways to engage them in that way? So you're co-creating and not necessarily just making something for them.

Eddie Rester 38:30

Right, which I think when you look at the church, historically, their professional youth directors and children's ministers happened in the 1950s.

Angela Patterson 38:40 Mm hmm.

Eddie Rester 38:41

So we are 70, almost 75 years into something that the church had not previously had for over 1900 years. And so the idea that you would put kids in silos and never let them come to worship or never let them have a voice in things or never let them lead in worship is really, it's a fairly new phenomenon in the church itself. And so, I'm not a researcher, but I'm about to make a statement that somebody should research.

Angela Patterson 38:55 Right. Okay. I like it.

Eddie Rester 39:21

As that model has grown through the 50s, 60s, 70s, and 80s, you begin to see the turn in the church, in the 60s, 70s, and 80s, of significant decline, particularly as those people became adults and disengaged from the church and became a part of the nones. And I wonder, I mean, they're drastically different--again I've got no research on this other than some graphs people have given me. And Angela's like, "I'm going to stab him, if I ever meet Eddie Rester in person."

Chris McAlilly 39:52
And Eddie also stayed at a Holiday Inn Express last night, you know.

Eddie Rester 39:56 That's right.

Angela Patterson 39:59 Oh, there we go!

Eddie Rester 39:59

Just wonder sometimes if when we began to silo those kids, if that didn't have an unintended consequence, much like... And you can't have that... You can't do that research. But I just wonder if we are the victims of our own work at times?

Angela Patterson 40:15

I mean, it's an excellent question. And from our work, what we understand about connection and the importance of it, I think it's heightened in this particular day and age because of the technological innovation we were talking about. But that's also a function of adolescent development and young adult development, that connection is so key. And anyone who has ever had a teenager in their house knows how important it is for them to be in touch with their friends and people that they care about. So perhaps we did do some damage in creating that model. But I would assume that at the time, we thought, "No, this will be great, because then they can be around each other."

Eddie Rester 40:57
Yeah. Exactly. And they need that.

Angela Patterson 40:57

And it's perfect, you know, and it'll be fun, right? We're adults who don't do fun. They can go over there and have fun with the people that are tasked with creating fun, right. And it's interesting, you mentioned this, because we're working on a grant from the Lilly Foundation. It's a three-year grant where we're studying, across the country, what's working in Christian youth ministry. And one of the things that we're diving into as a part of that work is what is fun? And what does that mean, when we start thinking about kind of exemplars and exemplar programs and ministries? How does fun fall into that? Because it can be... I think there's a lot of pressure for churches to feel like, "we have to create something fun, otherwise they won't come." And that's not always necessarily the case. It really has little to do with fun and much more with connection.

Chris McAlilly 40:58

So I wonder if, you know, a lot of what I hear you saying is, prioritize in-person connection, prioritize belonging before any form of a belief structure, either a thought or practice, would be engaged. I wonder if there are other... If you're either a parent or someone working with adolescents, I wonder if you could chart out that journey from 13 to 25. What are some of the key markers along that journey, that if you were going to try to navigate it with a young person that you would need to kind of have in kind of in the backdrop of your framework, or some of the things that would allow you to engage that path well, with a young person?

Angela Patterson 42:47

Oh, such a good question. And I'm going to... This isn't something that Springtide specifically studies. So I'm going to put my adolescent development hat on a little bit and spitball just a tad. I'm not gonna get too far out of my lane. But you know, as we think about early adolescence, many times young people are still rooted in whatever faith tradition they've been given, or none at all. But they start to have an awareness of the world. And this kind of concept of right and wrong, things around justice. We kind of see that through, I would say 13 to 16. That starts to get very real, and it can be fairly black and white. And there can, because of the emotions and the moods in early adolescence, there can be lots of, "That's wrong," a lot of righteous indignation there. And as they get older, they become more accustomed to nuance and shades of gray in some of these kind of larger issues. And so in early adolescence, just helping them along with questions that start to emerge at that point, and doing the best you can to help kind of walk alongside them as they're just kind of setting their foot into this, because a lot is changing in early adolescence for them, across the board. And a lot of it can seem counterintuitive, contradictory. It's just confusing. So any way that you can help them to navigate that confusion with their religious and spiritual lives or otherwise, is always a good trajectory. The path of exploration just continues as you get into what we would consider senior high school and college, and they start to ask more nuanced questions. Because, I think, because of the increased flow of information, their questions might be fairly nuanced, quicker than you think. Right? Depending on how much they're engaged and paying attention to things, things that really resonate with them. Many of the young people we talked to care greatly about things like climate justice, and racial and ethnic diversity, LGBTQ rights, all of these sorts of things. So you might find that the older they get, they're developing positions on these things. And they're trying to understand how their faith fits into that. And helping them to navigate any contradictions that they might see. Many young people that we've talked to say, "I left church or I didn't want to go to church, because it was in direct conflict with the values that I hold."

Eddie Rester 45:38 Right.

Angela Patterson 45:38

Or, "my friends from school, I didn't think would be welcomed there because of XYZ identities." That sort of stuff, we hear quite a bit. And so how might you be able to walk alongside them and help them navigate the incongruence that they're seeing? And that extends onward through college age and beyond, just trying to get a footing of, "I have these big questions, how do I get answers to them? And once I have those answers, how did they align with what I understand to be my personal values, and my true north," that sort of thing. And sometimes they align perfectly with the teachings of the Church. But I would argue that for a lot of us, there's things that are in conflict, and things that are confusing and things that we don't understand. And so that part of the path of exploration is not new to anybody who's been on a faith journey. So how might you be able to walk a couple of steps ahead of them, maybe, and show them how to start to parse those things apart?

Eddie Rester 46:45

Right. To know that you can, for all of us, who are part of the church, that there's simply things that we live with, that incongruence, and we just walk with it for a while. I think, and that's that vulnerability you were talking about earlier, to be able to say, to a 16-year-old, "yeah, I'm not sure how I feel about that, either. But let's figure it out over... I trust that we're going to figure it out over time." Or "it will become more clear over time." And we just, you know, I think a season of helping those kids, again, frame the world that they're experiencing, which is a great and glorious and amazing world, that sometimes, we need, as you could call it, we need guides walking alongside with us.

Angela Patterson 47:33

We do and the Church is really well positioned to do that, if they are willing to be vulnerable and authentic and transparent. Because these, Gen Z in particular, because that's who we've studied the most. They are really good about being able to see when someone is not showing up as 100% themselves.

Eddie Rester 47:56 Right.

Angela Patterson 47:57

So it's to the Church's best interest just to be totally upfront with who they are and what they believe. And let people, let young people interact with that rather than feeling that we have to put on a face or a front or position this this kind of way so young people will pay attention to us. That is probably not a recipe for success.

Eddie Rester 48:21
Yeah. Well, Angela, thank you for your time today. This has been a great conversation. So your website is angelapatterson.com. Is that right?

Angela Patterson 48:32
So I'm at drangelapatterson.com. And then Springtide is springtideresearch.org. And we are Springtide is our handle I think on pretty much all the social media outlets. So.

Eddie Rester 48:49

A lot, a lot of great research there, particularly on mental health and Gen Z, some things about the church and purpose. It's really well done, and you can purchase their most recent research as well. So thank you so much for your time.

Angela Patterson 49:03
Thank you. It's a great conversation. Thank you for having me.

Chris McAlilly 49:06 Thanks, Angela.

Eddie Rester 49:06
[OUTRO] Thanks for listening. If you've enjoyed the podcast, the best way to help us is to like, subscribe, or leave a review.

Chris McAlilly 49:15

If you would like to support this work financially or if you have an idea for a future guest you can go to theweight podcast.com. [END OUTRO]