What Young Catholics Truly Want

One advantage I suppose to the condition of never quite having grown up is I spend time with young adults. This is becoming more and more difficult as I am less and less young myself — before my hair turned entirely grey I could fit in a little easier. Still, one thing I hear from time to time is a cry in the wilderness about what young Catholics truly want.  Maybe I get to hear it because I’m 1) not their parents, and 2) not a priest. But especially from the better educated or more sensitive, some variation on this is common

The problem is all these pastors, youth pastors and music directors keep telling us young folk what bores us, what we really like, what we find interesting. And guess what, THEY’RE WRONG!

There’s a young woman with a blog who calls herself Rachel and wrote an essay What Young Catholics Truly Want. I recommend it. Some of the comments are evidently from priests who seem to know what Young Catholics Truly Want and want (evidently) to give it to them, but they’re afraid of alienating Catholics my age on up. I don’t quite know what to tell them about that particularly, but it sure looks to me like the concept of Youth Ministry should be revisited. Any Young Catholics reading this? What do you think?