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The pandemic undoubtedly left its mark on many different aspects of church life. In some cases, those areas came back stronger than ever and revealed what different groups need from the church. Youth ministry is one of those areas that came back with new vigour. The diocese of New Westminster sent 22 people -  its largest delegation ever- to the 2025 Canadian Lutheran Anglican Youth (CLAY) Gathering in Saskatoon. In addition, the diocesan Missioner for Youth and Diocesan Youth Movement chair served as the national chair of the CLAY planning committee. 

Lauren Pinkney, the diocesan missioner for youth and the chair of the Diocesan Youth Movement (DYM) has been involved in youth ministry in the diocese for many years. Through that work, she became involved in CLAY gatherings and was made vice-chair of the national planning committee in 2023 and chair of the committee for the 2025 CLAY gathering. The entire gathering is organized with the assistance of three permanent staff members from the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada and the Anglican Church of Canada, as well as seven volunteer planning committee members. They worked together for two years to make the national gathering possible. 

Lauren Pinkney said she realized the most important element to planning a successful gathering would be bringing together a planning committee that was able to build “strong relationships to be able to show up for each other.”  That was accomplished via remote and strategic in-person gatherings, where important decisions were made that reflected the expertise of the youth ministers on the committee. 

“For the first time ever, we intentionally chose to hold CLAY in a church,” Pinkney said. This reflected the planning committee’s own observations that youth need a way to feel that the church is theirs. “We wanted this to feel organic, in a familiar space for youth. We wanted to show off the beauty of church spaces. They’re stunning and we wanted to highlight the variety of ways we can use them,” said Pinkney. Using a church space also offered the opportunity to set up a low-sensory space for youth who are neurodiverse or struggling with trauma. “This was a direct response to feedback from youth at the 2023 CLAY gathering.” 

Throughout the planning, Pinkney said the diversity and similarities of the youth across the country became visible. “Not everyone’s youth ministry experience is the same,” she said. Some youth are engaged in parish-level youth groups, others get youth-focused faith formation via church summer camps, while others only see intentional youth ministry at gatherings like CLAY. 

“This meant we couldn’t assume shared past experiences, and couldn’t assume everyone knew what to expect when it comes to how to be together.”

It also meant recognizing that there is no one right way to worship with youth, or to experience faith. “For maybe 70 percent of youth, jumping up and down in front of a praise band is great, but it’s not for all the youth. We also don’t all have praise bands in our parishes, so we need to show there is more than one form of experiencing the beauty of worship, not just being whipped up into extreme emotions. 

After two years of hard work, for Pinkney, the validation of that work arrived in two particular moments during the gathering in Saskatoon. 

“On Friday night, we came back to Zion Lutheran after a day of activities. The church had had a flood earlier that day. We had an extremely small team of about five people on site and had to source an extra 35 chairs and tables and move 50-60 that were already set up into a different space. In 2 hours, we moved everything. The youth finally arrived and had no clue about the changes that had been made. The last table was put down as the first group rolled in for dinner. They had the most incredible dance party after dinner, and they were exploring this maze of a church to find their friends, find the music, playing dodgeball in the gym, and going to the chill space. It was incredible,” Pinkney recalled. 

The second moment came at the close of the gathering. “ The planning committee created questions asking youth to come up with words representing what they want to say back to church. They were also asked to give longer paragraph answers about what they feel the church needs to pay attention to. We then pulled quotes from those paragraphs and words, and created a video making a prayer out of the quotes from those paragraphs. It’s a love letter from the youth to the church. It makes me cry every time,” Pinkney said.