It is not hyperbole to describe our current moment—globally, nationally, ecclesially, politically, culturally, epidemiologically—as apocalyptic, in its sense of “unveiling” the deep fissures dividing people and the crumbling infrastructure of our systems and institutions. It is becoming increasingly clear that 21st century church models will not serve the church of the 22nd century.
The “generation gap,” an outgrowth of social, economic, and cultural forces dating back to the 19th century, frustrates possibilities of fellowship between young people and older adults. Many young adults face challenges that did not confront previous generations, such as lifelong cycles of economic instability; increased experience and witnessing of violence; generation-unique benchmarks for adulthood; significantly high reported rates of depression and loneliness; and navigating digital, virtual, and in-person relationships.
Hope for Challenging Times
Consequently, many congregations feel (and are) unprepared and ill-equipped to minister with young adults as they face these challenges. The resulting chasm can make it difficult for young adults and churches to see each other as beneficial relationship and ministry partners. Even worse, fear emerges and stifles meaningful exchanges across generational bounds, particularly when congregations must move beyond the walls of their sanctuaries to engage constituents of another generation.
In these challenging times, people of faith are pressed—and inspired—to find new ways of creating community and supporting spiritual growth. Developing these new models of communal and spiritual growth requires an intergenerational transfer of wisdom and innovative ideas that ensure the Gospel message is translatable in worship, mission, and practice.
The BRIDGE Initiative strives to create connection and healing among and between young adults and Christian congregations by:
- Strengthening communities and invigorating the 21st century church by connecting the gifts and values of young adults in their twenties with the divine mission of congregations.
- Addressing the social, generational, and theological breaches that frustrate relationships and possibilities for transformation.
- Creating innovative spaces that connect young adults’ talents and needs with the lived wisdom of churches, community groups, and Candler initiatives.
To accomplish these objectives, The BRIDGE Initiative is partnering with Fear+Less Dialogues, an organization founded by Associate Professor of Pastoral Care and Counseling Gregory C. Ellison II that creates unique spaces for unlikely partners to see gifts in others, hear value in stories, and work for change and transformation in self and others.
The BRIDGE Innovation Hub will convene two year-long cohorts of congregational teams to learn, develop, test, and implement new approaches to ministry with young adults. These cohorts will engage in a series of educational and participatory experiences through the late summer and early fall (Cohort One in 2023; Cohort Two in 2024) in preparation for Innovation Labs in the following winter and spring (Cohort One in 2024; Cohort Two in 2025).
Congregational teams will then discern and develop novel ministry ideas that will be funded by the BRIDGE Initiative. Selected teams will receive financial, educational, and spiritual support for up to one year as they develop their own context specific young adult ministries.
Our cohort findings will be compiled into resources that will inspire and equip other congregations and faith leaders with new practices to responsibly engage and support young adults as they grow and develop in faith and community.
Join Our Cohort
If you are interested in exploring participation in our 2024-2025 cohort, please read the following description and reach out with any questions.
Apply for participation in the cohort or contact BRIDGE Project Coordinator Ryan Snider for additional questions.
In September 2024, the BRIDGE Innovation Hub will convene its second year-long cohort of congregational teams to learn, develop, test, and implement new approaches to ministry alongside young adults in metropolitan Atlanta. This cohort will engage in a series of educational and participatory experiences through the fall in preparation for Innovation Labs in the winter and spring 2025. There, congregational teams will discern and develop novel ministry ideas that will be funded by the BRIDGE initiative. Our cohort findings will be compiled into resources meant to inspire and equip other congregations and faith leaders with new practices to responsibly engage and support young adults as they grow and develop in faith and community.
We’re looking for churches who:
- Are located in metropolitan Atlanta
- Are enthusiastic about engaging in ministry with young adults in their 20s.
- Commit to develop and experiment with new and innovative ministries and approaches.
- Have an existing population of young adult leaders in and/or around the congregation.
- Exhibit a desire to see gifts in others, hear stories of unlikely partners, and remain open to change in self and others.
We’re looking for church leaders who will:
- Commit to attend The Innovation Learning & Lab Sessions
- Innovation Learning Retreat – New Ways of Seeing, Hearing, and Changing
- September 20-22, 2024 at The Ignatius House in Sandy Springs, Georgia.
- Mandatory attendance for all five team members from Friday night through Sunday morning.
- In-Person Innovation Lab Sessions: Creating, Testing, Implementing, and Funding
- Three in-person sessions
- January 18th, February 8th, and February 22nd from 10:00 a.m to 3:00 p.m at Candler School of Theology.
- Imagine, design, and implement creative ministry initiatives.
- Offer necessary encouragement and resources to the congregation’s innovation team.
- Commit to the longevity and sustainability of your church’s future ministries alongside young adults.
- Three in-person sessions
- In-Person Innovation Lab Sessions: Creating, Testing, Implementing, and Funding
What can I expect as a member of a BRIDGE cohort?
- Partnership with 9 total churches within metro Atlanta for a one-year term.
- Church leaders will be asked to gather and sustain a team consisting of five members: each team must include a pastor, an invested lay leader, and at least one young adult (23-29). The cohort leader will use discretion in choosing two more team members who will contribute to the success and longevity of their church’s young adult ministry (this might be an additional pastor, lay leader, or other young adults from the church, leadership team, or the community). If you are challenged in locating a young adult to fill your team roster, please do not be discouraged from applying!
- Engagement with immersive, participatory educational and innovation experiences to develop a new ministry vision with young adults.
- Development of project proposals eligible for potential funding:
- Cohort grants– up to $72,000 per cohort: Cohorts design a ministry innovation that will benefit all teams within the cohort and make a significant impact on the leadership, health, and spiritual wellbeing of young adults.
- Congregational grants – up to $20,000 per congregational team: Each congregational team may apply for up to $20,000 each for congregation-specific funding.
- Mini-grants – $500 mini-grants: Experiment with short-term innovations which will serve as practice data for longer-term or larger innovations later in the process.
- Participate in BRIDGE-provided coaching/support/enrichment alongside educational and Innovation Hub sessions.
- Celebrate during the Festival of Learning: a time of sharing, dreaming, networking, and possible funding!
Still interested and excited?
We invite you to complete the following application for selection to participate in The BRIDGE Young Adult Ministry Innovation Hub. To be considered for the 2024-2025 cohort year, please submit your completed application no later than Friday, MARCH 22, 2024.
Institutions:
Turning academic research into practical resources to help make the church the best place for young people to grow
Qualitative and quantitative research on the inner and outer lives of young people, ages 13 to 25.
Books:
Back-Pocket God: Religion and Spirituality in the Lives of Emerging Adults
Coming Up Short: Working-Class Adulthood in an Age of Uncertainty
Emerging Adulthood: The Winding Road from the Late Teens through the Twenties
Lilly Endowment Inc.
Candler School of Theology’s BRIDGE Initiative is funded by the Lilly Endowment Inc. “to help congregations find new ways to engage and support young adults.”
Lilly Endowment Inc. was founded in 1937 by J.K. Lilly, Sr. and his sons Eli and J.K. Jr. for the “promotion and support of religious, educational or charitable purposes.” Throughout its history, the Endowment has sought to nurture the human spirit, intellect and character. When once asked what the main purpose of the Endowment should be, Eli Lilly said, “I hope we could help improve the character of the American people.”
The Lilly founders viewed character and human development in the context of community and encouraged unselfish concern for the welfare of others. The value they placed on philanthropy, which was in large part motivated by their religious faith, was expressed by Eli Lilly when he said: “Owing everything we are to the past and present generations, each of us must be willing to give unstinted help to others.”
Meet the BRIDGE Team
Dr. Elizabeth Corrie
Co-director, The BRIDGE Young Adult Ministry Innovation Hub; Professor in the Practice of Youth Education and Peacebuilding
Elizabeth Corrie’s teaching draws on commitments to both peace with justice and the education of young people, particularly the development of teaching and ministry that empower people for global citizenship. She joined Candler’s faculty in 2007, and has served as director of the Youth Theological Initiative (YTI) for high school students, as well as Candler’s Religious Education program. Her research interests include ministries with youth and young adults, transformative pedagogy, theories of nonviolence, and conflict transformation. Corrie is the author of Youth Ministry as Peace Education: Overcoming Silence, Transforming Violence (Fortress Press, 2021), a project that draws on her years of youth ministry work and focused on creating a new approach to youth ministry that teaches young people how to overcome disempowerment and transform violence in their communities.
EMAILecorrie@emory.edu
The Rev. Dr. Gregory C. Ellison II
Co-director, The BRIDGE Young Adult Ministry Innovation Hub; Associate Professor of Pastoral Care and Counseling
Gregory C. Ellison II joined the Candler faculty in 2009. His teaching draws primarily from his work with the organization he founded called Fear+Less Dialogues, a nonprofit organization that creates unique spaces for unlikely partners to have hard, heartfelt conversations on taboo subjects like racism, classism, and community violence. Ellison’s research focuses on caring with marginalized populations, pastoral care as social activism, and 20th and 21st century mysticism.
Ellison is also the author of two books based on his research over the last decade, Cut Dead But Still Alive: Caring for African American Young Men (Abingdon Press, 2013), and Fearless Dialogues: A New Movement for Justice (Westminster John Knox, 2017), and is the editor of Anchored in the Current: Discovering Howard Thurman as Educator, Activist, Guide, and Prophet (Westminster John Knox, 2020).
EMAILgelli01@emory.edu
The Rev. Dr. E. Michelle Ledder
Project Manager
E. Michelle Ledder currently serves the Fear+Less Dialogues team in curriculum development, as an animator, and as project manager for the BRIDGE Initiative multi-year grant awarded to Candler School of Theology. Her academic connections with Emory University include both a master of divinity degree focusing on theology and ethics (2010) and her doctoral work, where she created an anti-racist model for white preachers to preach and teach anti-racism without perpetrating more racism (2022). Ledder is the co-founder of 4REALS, LLC with the Rev. Sheila M. Beckford. Together, they are the co-authors of two books published by Chalice Press: Anti-Racism 4REALS: REAL Talk with REAL Strategies in REAL Time for REAL Change (2021) and Doing Anti-Racist Business: Dislodging and Dismantling Racism with the 4REALS (2023). She currently serves as an assistant minister at Metropolitan AME Church in Washington, DC, where the Rev. William H. Lamar IV is pastor. Michelle lives in Baltimore with her pit-boxer mix, Cashmere.
The Rev. Dr. Ryan Snider
Project Coordinator
Ryan Snider is an ordained elder in The United Methodist Church. He has served as a pastor, college chaplain, and instructor of religious studies. Today, he works with young adults in Atlanta. Ryan earned his master of divinity degree from Duke Divinity School and his doctor of ministry degree in 2023 from Candler School of Theology. In his spare time, Ryan enjoys hiking, running, and being outside with family.
Young Adult Wisdom Consultants
D’Marquis Allen
D’Marquis Allen is an experienced project manager and management consultant with a passion for making organizations run better and be better in the world through innovation. After earning his BA in creative computation from Southern Methodist University, he spent the first five years of his career leading projects across the utilities, oil and gas, and retail industries with a focus on organizational change management.
In 2021, D’Marquis enrolled as a dual degree student at Candler and Emory’s Goizueta Business School to pursue Master of Divinity (MDiv) and Master of Business Administration (MBA) degrees. D’Marquis is an ordained itinerant deacon in the African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church and shares the denomination’s commitment towards justice, healing, and liberation for Black people. He currently resides in Atlanta, and when he is not at the driving range practicing his golf swing, can be found bass fishing, reading, playing pick-up basketball, cycling with friends, and spending time with family.
Aileen Nicholás
Aileen Nicolás (she/her) is a dedicated lay leader within the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Atlanta. Currently a student at Candler, she anticipates graduating with her Master of Divinity in the spring of 2024. Aileen holds a master’s degree in geography from the University of Georgia. Her academic pursuits primarily revolve around religious education as pedagogy and working with youth, particularly those from Latin American immigrant communities. Her research focuses on empowering and engaging young individuals, both within Georgia and nationwide. During her leisure time, Aileen can be found taking walks around the city, enjoying quality time with her two cats Frijolito and Odin, tending to her virtual farm on Stardew Valley, and eagerly seeking opportunities to savor the delights of Korean cuisine.