Things Are Changing, Should We?

Center-based Lutheran campus ministry has been around for over 80 years in Cedar Falls. Very good ministry has happened here and at Lutheran student centers around the country. However, it is an expensive way to do ministry, and it is increasingly apparent that we are missing a significant portion of college-aged young adults. I believe we are at a place where we would do well to reassess our way of doing ministry to college-aged young adults.

In 1922 when Lutheran campus ministry became an independent entity in Cedar Falls, Lutheran college students who choose to study in northeastern Iowa might have chosen to attend either Luther or Wartburg College where the religion faculty was expected to tend to the student’s spiritual needs or they might have chosen to attend Iowa State Teachers College (the present UNI). There were not many other options, so a campus ministry that addressed the specific spiritual needs of college students in Cedar Falls made a lot of sense.

Today, the demographics are changing. There are increasing numbers of students studying at community colleges, attending classes at local satellite campuses, or even working toward degrees online, from home. They tend to be more spread out across the synod, and they tend to be closer to home (often living at home), but the current reality is, that there are more students studying at these institutions in northeastern Iowa than are currently enrolled at UNI. What this means is that there is a significant numbers of young adults in the Northeastern Iowa Synod that are being missed by the current way we deliver ministry to college students and young adults.

There is not going to be a simple fix for this issue. It is not simply that the context has changed. The text itself is changing. There was a time when you could map out a story that would fit most college students. They graduated from high school, went to college, got a job, often got married… The issues along this storyline were fairly predictable. These days there is no usual story. There are many stories, and they are not predictable. The life choices of young adults are becoming more varied and more complex. Will the old models continue serve us well? Or do we need to start to develop new models and new understandings?

On Ministering to College Students

What do college students really need in the way specialized ministry?

For the last several weeks, I have been standing over at the student union on campus as a part of the New Student Orientation fair. There are all sorts of organizations represented that might be of interest to incoming students, and in the corner the various campus ministries are represented. A few have centers like ours, a few are sponsored by para-church organizations, and some are sponsored by local congregations.

I listen to Kate, one of our students give the 2 minute version of what the LSC is about: "The LSC has a free coffee house on Tuesday and Thursday nights where you can get free coffee drinks, smoothies, and cookies or just hang out. We have a supper on Wednesday nights where Pastor Scott sometimes makes his famous spaghetti and cheese bread. We have worship late at night on Wednesdays so that you can either sleep in on Sunday mornings or go to the church of you choice, and we sponsor mission trips in the spring and fall." Somewhere in the spiel she will usually mention, "I have met all of my close friends here at the LSC."

What should be the focus of a campus ministry? It was once worship, and the perhaps the most important reason we have worship at the LSC is timing (none of the 3 congregations have worship at 9:30 pm-- a good time for most college students). What we have been focusing on is hospitality and mission trips. The question is what should we be focusing on?

Where are we headed?

It is summer, and summer being a good time to reflect on campus ministry (less students and less program) I thought it would be a good time to start a conversation on where the Lutheran Student Center in Cedar Falls should be headed in the next few years. It has been said that center based campus ministries are the dinosaurs of how campus ministry is delivered. It is true, we have been around for a long time (since the 1920's), we could be on the verge of extinction, and it is just possible that some new species of campus ministry is waiting in the wings to more efficiently take our place.

My friend Mark at the synod office sent me a link to an article by Michael Nielsen, that while it has nothing to do with campus ministry per se seems to express a concern that I have about the way we have been doing campus ministry in Cedar Falls. So this blog will be an attempt to start that conversation.

I would like us to ask the big questions!

The beginning question is pretty basic: Should there really be an independent center based campus ministry in Cedar Falls, a community that has 3 ELCA congregations each with staff dedicated to young adult ministry?