| Young adults: Missing in action for how long?  By Chris Owens As a 30-year-old pastor, I can tell you that its very hard to be a young adult in most of our United Methodist churches. On the one hand, young adults are too old to be in with youth, but then again, theyre too young to fit into their parents age-level activities. With nothing in the church for them, young adults leave, go out into the world, and most of them never return. Meanwhile, young adults are living complex, highly mobile, fast-paced lives of work, school, family and relationships, most often without the fellowship and gbwc_superuserance of the church. They need Jesus, and they need to see him in you. United Methodist churches are seeing and feeling the void of people between the ages of 18 and 35. All the statistics point to their absence.  People between the ages of 12 and 30 only make up 10-12 percent of our membership roles. The median age of a typical United Methodist is 56 and getting older. The average age of persons entering the ministry is 46. Lets face it, our churches and our leaders are aging, and young people, particularly those between the ages of 18 and 35, are missing in action.
Our churches need young adults. They are the lifeblood of creativity and innovation. Young adults have the daring, vision and energy to carry the ministry of the church into new, never before dreamed places. They are the parents of a new generation of children. Heres the point: without young adults, our churches will continue to age and decline without the energy and life of young people to lead the church forward into this next millennium. Because of this, one could argue that young adults are our most precious assets. And yet, there is a major disconnect between The United Methodist Church and a largely unchurched young adult population. In answer to this dilemma, the Baltimore-Washington Conference is facing the absence of young adults head on with two new initiatives. Last years annual conference members voted to create a new Council on Young Adult Ministry and to hire a conference coordinator of young adult ministry. Since then, a task force of young adults, with the help of several of our conference staff, have been working diligently to define the role and tasks of the future young adult coordinator and Council on Young Adult Ministry. Our vision for the council and coordinator is to be actively training and supporting local congregations to learn how to embrace, include, and disciple young adults. The coordinator, together with a dynamic, action-oriented council of young adults, will be gearing up to hit the streets and be in your churches in order to prepare you for a new venture in ministry. We want every apportionment dollar spent on the coordinator and council to turn right around to rally and equip local churches to be in ministry with young adults. In order to do this, we need your help. At the upcoming session of annual conference, the young adult task force will ask conference members for the funding needed to hire the coordinator of young adult ministry and to provide programming resources for the Council on Young Adult Ministry. Together, we can take a huge step of faith forward in the effort to embrace and be in ministry with young adults. At our young adult task force meetings, we have a vision weve talked and laughed about. Were looking for a day when the young people in church will scratch their heads and wonder: Now, how do you suppose we should go about getting some older people in our churches? Are you ready for this? The Rev. Chris Owens is a member of the Young Adult Task Force and a pastor of Hollywood UMC in Hollywood. | 
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