‘What strengths do the younger generation have?’

‘What strengths do the younger generation have?’ The youngest person in the group asked this question in a meeting of church leaders, exasperated at the negative tone of the conversation. It was an appropriate rebuke in the middle of a discussion about the apparent reduction of younger people seeking to serve full-time in gospel ministry.

It is easy to feel despair at our times. Anyone who has read Jonathan Haidt’s book The Anxious Generation or Abigail Shrier’s Bad Therapy will be aware of the increase in diagnosed mental health issues among young people. Both books raise valuable matters we need to consider – issues around smartphone technology, outsourcing childhood to experts and counsellors, creating a climate of fear and anxiety among parents in the ‘real’ world, and yet ignoring exposure to harm in the ‘online’ world.

We can add other factors too; Chris Van Tulleken argues that a diet of ultra-processed food affects not just our physical health but our mental well-being too. Family breakdown, institutionalised childcare from babyhood, and iPads acting as pacifiers even for babies all play their part. It feels like a perfect storm, which, when the impact of Covid is thrown in, makes it rage more fiercely. Lives have been blighted. I meet 20-somethings who talk of their anxiety, PTSD, and the triggers that stop them in their tracks so they can no longer function.