Now I have to admit, Ms. Rubenstein immediately captured my attention - before I even knew what she was talking about. But then I noticed her subject was MY daughter.
Well, in figurative sense anyway, because she was earnestly describing the solid trend underlying deep spirituality in today's young girls - the target readership of Seventeen. And that certainly describes my eleven year old - deeply spiritual -and very into fashion/music/popular culture - all of your normal pre-teen daughter kind of stuff. Only my daughter has dozens of music CDs by Christian artists, reads her bible daily, and prays with her friends - at school. And twice a day with her parents. And talks with Jesus like He's in the room (He is). And believes that faith is the activating component in healing. And pictures herself (sometimes) being a minister someday. And belongs to two different Christian youth groups - and so has an active circle of almost fifty kids who are right there with her. Which, all told, makes her a pretty mainstream American eleven year old girl of the early twenty first century.
Rubenstein talked about how for many years she was intrigued by why so many reader e-mails signed-off with "God Bless" at the end. That really surprised her. Like, her generation never did that. Why were so many young girls bringing up God. How strange. So this intrigued her. And she wanted to respond to it. I mean, like, that is her business, after all. Right? And how she had pitched the idea for this at her former magazine (more about that here. CosmoGirl! - Cosmo for girls? Scary.) but without success, and only brought out the spirituality column this past summer - after becoming the big boss at Seventeen. So this column she writes has stirred up all kinds of coverage. Articles are being written. She even landed a television interview with Tina Brown.
Faith: a very shrewd move. A good play. Seventeen scores with the readership once again. Everybody's happy. Right?
Here's the point of this post: Seventeen scrupulously maintains a value-neutral position on the MANY religious perspectives presented in their magazine. So kids are getting equal doses of Bah'ai - and Zoroastrianism. Wicca is presented alongside Christianity.
Don't get me wrong: I am a Scout leader and respect all people of faith and their right to worship. It was through Scouting, as a teenager, that I met Muslim young people for the first time. Those experiences prepared me well for the complex sensitivities required when traveling in the Holy Land - after graduating from high school. And helped me ask the BIG questions which deepened my belief in Jesus Christ, as nurtured by my parents.
And that's why I suggest parents get active in discussion of faith and spirituality with their children. And likewise, with respect, suggest they get off the "whatever" drift current - which may have characterized their spiritual upbringing.
Because that's NOT how our kids are wired these days. Children today are seekers. Intellectually AND spiritually curious. Don't leave it to a magazine to answer that curiousity. Take your child (and yourself) on a spirit quest. I know where that leads me: to church.
Kids today have a deep spritual yearning. Over the course of the interview, Rubenstein pointed out that their parents (and their former president) have allowed them to have "too much information" and not enough context. And that children embrace faith to find order amidst the chaos.
Rubenstein, who was raised in the Muslim faith, knows how to capture popular culture trends. That's her job. It is up to today's parents, who arguably came up through childhood in a spiritual "trough" - to keep up with their kids yearning curiousity during this period of "peak" interest in faith and spirituality.
Christian groups are (once again) coming late to the table on this important topic. But do check out this youth-culture perspective on the issue from the Christian youth magazine Teen Mania Ministries:
Seventeen's "Faith" Section Opens the Door for Religious Expression
Today's generation of young people are desperate for answers to the deeper questions of life and Seventeen magazine has responded to their cries. In an attempt to offer answers to the spiritually hungry, this teen glamour magazine has gone where they've never gone before. Slipped in-between pages filled with beauty tips and celebrity gossip lies a new section on "Faith."
Seventeen's readers now have the opportunity to share their own opinions on certain religious topics, read inspirational quotes, and tell personal stores of spiritual struggles. An immediate favorite among Seventeen magazine's 14-million readers, this section has a serious tone, discussing real-life issues openly.
The person behind it all is Seventeen magazine's editor-in-chief, Atoosa Rubenstein. Raised Muslim, she began the faith section not to spread a religious message, but provide an opportunity to discuss issues important to teenage girls, noticing that "more and more of our readers were talking about their faith."
Laurie Whaley, who works for the division of publishers that created Revolve (a top-selling Bible for girls that looks like a fashion magazine) was impressed that Seventeen was addressing religion in any form. She predicted it would attract readers. "The teen culture today, they're very, very much about faith," Whaley said.
Experts on religion and youth trends agree. Teenage Research Unlimited found that 58% of teens rank faith as among the most important parts of their life.
Rubenstein formed an interfaith advisory board for guidance, which includes two Christian ministers, a Catholic priest, Rabbi, Buddhist teacher, and two Muslims.
One of the board members is Fred Allen of Burning Bush Ministries, who said the wide-range of faiths is fine with him. He believes the magazine is "providing the truth to set its readers free."
"I'm not worried about Christianity getting lost," Allen said, "and I'm so glad that Seventeen is even allowing honest and genuine expression of faith from the Christian perspective to show up on their pages. (I think, in the long run), Jesus gains a lot of ground."
Seventeen's faith section provides a safe place for teens to boldly discuss their beliefs and their Christian readers have risen to the occasion. There's remains a stark contrast between comments of hopelessness and despair and the response of a born-again Christian, whose words radiate with hope and joy. Although a seeking reader may not be led to salvation, this new section provides the potential to get them thinking.
"We talk to a big portion of the young women of this country, and this is what they're interested in, and no one else is talking to them about it," Rubenstein said. "I think that kids today want and need answers, because they live in a very complicated world."
But is it safe for teens to turn to Seventeen magazine for answers? This new faith section not only represents Christian values, but also those of Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, Hindus, and whoever else has an opinion.
Yes, Seventeen's faith section does provide an opportunity for Christians to speak out, but will the Biblical truths shared be considered "just another good opinion"? With no acknowledgement of absolute truth, this melting pot of worldviews can have a dangerous influence on the vulnerable teens who are on a quest for God. Presented with a smorgasbord of religious beliefs, teens can pick and choose whatever pleasant-sounding doctrine they like, coming to their own self-determined opinion of truth.
Although this recent addition to Seventeen magazine opens the doors for religious expression, it provides no easy way to discern Truth from post-modern deception. It will either open young people's eyes to the Truth, or lead them further from it.
Check out teens' responses to Seventeen's faith-based questions for yourself, updated regularly at www.seventeen.com/bigquestion
Urbane Analysis: Seventeen Magazine gives parents plenty enough to worry about as it is...
5 comments:
Interesting post. As a former youth pastor, I'm always interested in the pop-cultural trends present in mainstream media (particularly the both vogue and vague "spiritual, but not religious" position), though I'm more concerned that Christian attempts to garner a pop-culture audience err by merely mirroring secular culture and placing a wwjd stamp of approval on faith commodities that negelect to question the underlying assumptions in our hyper-consumer-driven society that have crept popularly into the church franchises a la 'purpose-driven.'
In response to the quote:
"With no acknowledgement of absolute truth, this melting pot of worldviews can have a dangerous influence on the vulnerable teens who are on a quest for God. Presented with a smorgasbord of religious beliefs, teens can pick and choose whatever pleasant-sounding doctrine they like, coming to their own self-determined opinion of truth.
Although this recent addition to Seventeen magazine opens the doors for religious expression, it provides no easy way to discern Truth from post-modern deception."
The problem with "acknowledging absolute truth" is that it attempts to assert an epistemological framework that has long expired in the work of wittgenstein, derrida, and foucault... granted, teens are not intellectually ready to process the intricacies of nietzsche's philology, but to combat postmodern pluralism with an assertion that "absolute truth" is indeed absolute, knowable, and empirically objective is really a losing battle.
Any student who later investigates the intellectual developments that have succeeded our post-Enlightment rationalism will quickly debunk the illusions of one dimensional cartesian epistemology. This is why faith is often dismissed in adulthood as young people are presented with, as you noted, too much information and not enough context. I'm not suggesting that there's no place for any apologetic foundation in the spiritual development of young christians- I do think it is important that young people understand that faith in Christ does not require intellectual suicide.
However, the problem lies in an apologetic method/philosophy that simply denies the reality of our present culture by insisting that we take enormous steps backwards in order to establish a mythological and reactionary idea like absolute truth, or better yet, biblical inerrancy. Rather than attempting to deny reality and stem the tide of the inevitable dominant secular worldview with its own presuppositions, we must instead reframe the argument by questioning the underlying assumptions present in modern scientific rationalism- that it is even important whether or not truth is absolute and knowable.
i think we can all agree (hopefully) that when the scriptures use the word "truth" (whether in john's gospel or the words of jesus himself), it has very little to do with our modern conception of modern/postmodern epistemology. john was battling greek neo-platonic gnositicism and jesus was operating out of a very jewish first century framework of temple & torah. their vernacular is narrative, not propositional truth.
ultimately, the postmodern conundrum is as much opportunity as it is danger. pluralism is rampant and inevitable- but we cannot simply advance the marketability of jesus by assuming he can advertise truth louder than the many other options available. instead, we must confront pluralism by questioning the fact-value dichotomy present in our society- a reality that has relegated the church to the private realm of opinion for decades. but that's an argument for another day.
thanks again for the thought-provoking post.
I do agree with the concepts and ideas that the Seventeen magazine promotes. Indeed, many teenagers are helped by the advices given in this magazine.
I'm not saying that this magazine doesn't have some positive effects, but one negative one is promoting low calories diets.
We should emphasize more that low calorie diet doesn't mean only weight loss but also health. Combined with taking multivitamins, it's even better.
It's admirable that this magazine is trying to offer helpful advice to teenagers, especially on weight problems. Still, it's a lot better to read a diet book and see what a specialist has to say about this.
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