Back to Professionalism

Catholic Coordinators of Youth Ministry: Who They Are and What They Do

Contemporary Roman Catholic parish youth ministry is only 25 years old. During that relatively brief history, the role of the Coordinator of youth Ministry has slowly evolved and gained stature in the church. The CYM’s job description and responsibilities have dramatically shifted in response to a wide variety of factors. These factors include an evolving understanding of the theory and practice of youth ministry; the changing dynamics of parish life; the often competing expectations of bishops and pastors with those of parents and the teens themselves; and, inevitably, economics.

We at Saint Mary’s Press in Winona, Minnesota, have been deeply engaged in the emergence and development of Catholic youth ministry and, therefore, of the role of the CYM. We have been a major producer of published resources and services aimed at helping both define and equip the CYM. In response to continuing shifts in recent years, however, we began to wonder about CYMs today— who they are, what they do, and what they need. We decided to find out.

Solid Research

Saint Mary’s Press recently conducted extensive, professionally directed research involving Catholic CYMs throughout the country. Eighty of the roughly 180 U.S. Catholic dioceses provided their youth ministry contact lists—the full and part-time, paid and volunteer leaders of parish youth programs. We then randomly selected 291 of those leaders and conducted extensive, in-depth interviews with each. We asked about the leaders’ backgrounds and ministry experiences, the kinds of programs they coordinate, and what they felt they and the field of youth ministry need in terms of resources and training.

In this brief article I can only highlight some of the research data that might be of interest to youth ministry practitioners from other traditions and settings. A more complete summary of our findings is available from Saint Mary’s Press.

Catholic CYMs: Who Are They?

A Brief Look at the Numbers

The raw numbers alone tell an interesting and, some would say, surprising tale. For example, 81 percent of Catholic CYMs are women. Thirty-five percent are between 41 and 50 years old, and the median age is 40. Two-thirds have graduated from college, and half of those have done some graduate work. Fifty-five percent of CYMs work part-time at an average of 20 hours per week; two-thirds of those are paid.

A surprising statistic that begs for further study is that for all CYMs (full and part-time, paid and volunteer) the median number of years in the ministry is seven; the average (arithmetic mean) length is a little over nine years.

Fifty-six percent of CYMs have received some formal training in youth ministry; 22 percent of volunteers have no formal training but do have some past experience. Regardless of their training, the majority feel well-prepared for most of the CYM’s tasks: creating programs, working with volunteers, addressing teen issues, handling budgets, and finding resources. The only coordinating task for which they feel inadequately prepared is gaining the support and involvement of parents in their programs. This is true regardless of their training or experience.

The majority of the CYMs questioned are very upbeat about the state of their ministry on a variety of levels. Seventyone percent feel that the level of support they receive from their parish has increased since they started in the ministry. Forty-five percent think parental support has increased, while only 18 percent feel it has decreased.

What about the CYM’s experience with kids? It’s almost all good news. Two-thirds of the interviewees say that teen interest in matters of faith and religion has increased, as has their level of commitment to their faith and their ability to make sound moral decisions. The only downside is a whopping 88 percent of CYMs who think that teens are too busy and over-committed.

What Do the Numbers Mean?

The real fun of doing research lies in interpreting the numbers. However, this is also the most challenging and even controversial part. We haven’t yet completed the in-depth analysis of the data, but here are some initial impressions regarding the numbers.

There seems to be a nearly universal optimism from the CYMs concerning their role, the support they receive, and the responses from young people. They are an upbeat group. Most don’t even complain about their budget!

For years Catholics have presumed (and we apparently share this presumption with our Protestant friends) that the turnover among youth ministers continues to be a major problem. We frequently claim that the average youth minister lasts only 18 months or so. Yet we found that the average CYM has been in the ministry for nine years. As I noted above, this point begs for further research. What we didn’t ask, but now wish we had, was how many parishes the interviewees had worked for during their careers. The 18- month figure would still hold up if most of them had worked in five or six parishes. But does that seem likely? One would think that the CYMs would have left the ministry altogether if their experiences were that unstable and chaotic. Based on the data, however, we can’t know for sure.

Finally, we’re concerned that the emerging consensus within the Catholic church concerning the roles and responsibilities of the youth minister may not reflect their actual lived experiences. For example, as the role of the CYM has evolved and become increasingly professionalized (see the opening paragraph), the layers of responsibility and the skills required to handle them have grown dramatically. Yet our figures show that the majority of CYMs are part-time, and onethird are not paid. How much can we legitimately expect—in terms of credentials, range of programming, and so on—of such people? At what point will we start losing good-hearted and committed leaders because of a vision of the ministry that is so broad and inclusive that it becomes intimidating and overwhelming?

Catholic CYMs: What Do They Do?

A Brief Look at the Numbers

I noted above the changing role and job responsibilities of the coordinator of youth ministry in the Catholic church. Perhaps the single greatest shift has occurred in terms of the age group with whom the CYM works. When I entered youth ministry (back in the late 60s when we Catholics didn’t even use the term “youth ministry”), it was clear to whom I was called to serve—“high school kids,” which meant ninth through twelfth graders. Since about the mid-eighties, however, the responsibilities of the youth minister have shifted to include programming for junior high and even younger kids. Today, only 28 percent of CYMs serve senior high youth exclusively, while 68 percent are responsible for programming for both junior and senior high (just four percent work exclusively with junior high youth).

In the Catholic church, a common and often uncomfortable separation has historically existed between structured religious educational programs and broader youth ministry. In recent years, much effort has gone into integrating these dimensions of the ministry in terms of shared vision and actual programming. Sixty-one percent of the CYMs we interviewed are now responsible for both youth ministry (stereotypically identified with “youth group”) and adolescent religious education. And the vast majority—for us, a somewhat surprising 93 percent—include religious educational classes in their programming.

The vision of a holistic, integrated youth ministry has clearly taken root in Catholic youth ministry. When asked what activities they include in their programs, CYMs, in addition to structured religious educational classes, on a monthly basis include community service projects (95 percent), youth group meetings (90 percent), prayer meetings (49 percent), and confirmation classes (89 percent). In a typical year they include conferences or rallies (89 percent), various kinds of retreats (80+ percent), leadership training programs (73 percent), and mission trips (69 percent).

Not unexpectedly perhaps, summer programming drops off rather dramatically. Sixty percent of CYMs offer recreational opportunities of various kinds, but just 23 percent continue monthly meetings and 29 percent offer opportunities for service during the summer.

The alert reader, particularly one of a Protestant persuasion, may recognize a major gap in all these statistics. What about Bible study, a taken-for-granted component, if not the hallmark, of Protestant youth programs? With some hesitation, if not embarrassment, I reveal that 28 percent of Catholic CYMs include Bible study in their programming. But let me explore the reasons behind the data.

What Do the Numbers Mean?

Here are a few observations and intuitions prompted by the statistics regarding youth programming in Catholic parishes.

One of the defining characteristics of not only Catholic youth ministry, but of the contemporary Catholic church as a whole, is a dramatic increase in our focus on the scriptures. When asked to identify the areas in which the church’s youth ministry is falling short, 80 percent of CYMs say that we’re doing too little to encourage teens to read the Bible on their own. And of a list of 19 possible resources, the second most often requested resource is a Bible study for senior high youth (the number one requested resource is a guide to help parents respond to the faith questions and concerns of their teenage children).

Within Catholic youth ministry, stand-alone “Bible study groups” in the Protestant sense may never become a standard programming component. More likely, or at least more immediately, Catholic CYMs will continue their current efforts to integrate scripture into all dimensions of their programming and also increase their efforts to help young people make the Bible a key element in their personal spiritual life and practice.

The common inclusion of junior high programming under the umbrella of youth ministry prompts decidedly differing responses from various leaders of the ministry. On the one hand, many note the obvious appeal of and need for youth ministry programming for early adolescents, confirmed by the high percentage of junior high youth who frequently attend such programs. Success in attracting large numbers of junior high youth makes it easier for program leaders to justify and even lobby for expanding parish support.

On the other hand, an increasing number of leaders warn that the very success of junior high programming threatens the church’s ministry to senior high youth. As the numbers of participating young adolescents increase, the available time and resources that a parish can or will devote to senior high ministry often decreases. Proponents of junior high ministry immediately counter that the young adolescents reached through effective ministry will eventually demand similar attention as senior high youth, thereby enhancing the chances for the survival and success of senior high ministry. But the verdict is still out.

Some Catholic youth ministry leaders suggest that the summer months, which presumably offer more free time for young people, provide an opportunity for expanding youth ministry programming. When that possibility is presented to groups of already overworked CYMs, however, it’s often greeted with audible sighs, if not groans. Which leads to this final observation.

I noted earlier the growing tension created by the evolving job responsibilities of the CYM with the fact that the majority of CYMs work part-time and often as volunteers. Our brief profile of youth ministry programming helps explain that tension. Both the vision and practice of Catholic youth ministry have expanded and deepened dramatically in the last two decades. Leaders of Catholic youth ministry can and should be gratified by and proud of such growth. But greater challenges await us. And chief among them, I believe, is the need to develop not only multiple models of youth ministry programming but also, by extension, multiple ways of coordinating these programs. Are we creating a job description for CYMs that few people will be able to meet? If we take seriously the fact that many CYMs are part-time volunteers, how might this affect our programming choices?

These are exciting days for Catholic youth ministry. Catholic young people need and want good youth ministry more than ever before. Will the adult church respond? I’m confident that a future research project will show how we embraced and met that challenge.

Tom Zanzig is recognized internationally as an author, editor, and trainer in Catholic youth ministry and adolescent religious education. He guided the development of curricula for junior and senior high parish programs and authored two popular texts for Catholic high schools. He has trained youth leaders and catechists across the United States as well as in Canada, Australia, Germany, and the United Arab Emirates.