YOUTH MINISTRY

Freebie Fridays and the Teen Thing

Exciting and original ministry idea in Canadian parish 

By Sue Careless

Every Friday lunch hour during the school year over a hundred students from the local collegiate drop into the gym at St. Hilda’s in Oakville for chili, tuna pasta, soup and sandwiches or macaroni and cheese. The church is only a block and a half from Thomas A. Blakelock Secondary.

There is always a vegetarian option, even if it is only PBJs--peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. Sometimes dessert is make-your-own-sundaes with all the trimmings. Or it might be juice and cookies. The lunch program is completely free and began eight years ago. Most popular are the spring BBQs when the numbers double and the students sit outside. 

“Our philosophy is that God is a God of grace and we want to give a tangible expression to that. Jesus feed the 5,000; we’ve served 2,000 hot dogs in one month.”

After lunch there’s ping pong, foosball and air hockey. And every week there’s a movie trivia contest with chocolate bars for prizes. 

Jennifer Neal, the people’s warden, acts as emcee and organizes the menus each week. Eight church members—all but one of them retired—shop for the best deals in town and then prepare and serve the meals. The teens seem to enjoy these “alternate grandparents” as much as the retirees enjoy being with the youth. One Oakville man donates $150 a month to the food and the church contributes the difference.

Freebie Fridays draw an equal number of girls and guys from all grades. “Many started in grade nine and we have really got to know them,” said Rev. Paul Charbonneau, the rector.      

Charbonneau has ministered in Oakville for 14 years. He coached hockey at the school for five years which helped him establish credibility and good connections before the lunch program began. Principals and teachers are welcome any time so they know what’s going on. 

Charbonneau gives a three-minute mini-sermon during the meal that he knows has to be punchy. “They’re a tough audience but they listen.”  

“And we want them to think ‘otherly.’” So while the lunch is free, a “loonie loaf” is passed around to help sponsor two World Vision children. For Christmas 2006 the students bought goats for families in the developing world; this year it was a whole barnyard of animals though World Vision. 

Then every Friday night there is a drop-in called Teen Thing which is “growing by leaps and bounds” according to the church’s youth worker, Jeff Kendall, 32. “We’re seeing an average of twenty kids every week” most coming because of the Freebie Fridays. Only about a quarter are regular churchgoers. Kendall, who also mixes with the kids at the Freebie Fridays, is the bridge person who helps the kids feel comfortable coming to the evening group. It is his second year at the church.  

Teen Thing involves active games like dodge ball to blow off steam, occasional outings and a longer ten-minute talk with an open Bible. Kendall, who works in a games store, brings various board games in as well. The kids say they love having a “place to go crazy and have a lot of fun.” Kendall is pleased because for all the craziness, “It’s still safe, it’s still positive and it’s still fun.”

For kids who want something a little quieter there’s a hang-out room called the Keep where Kendall’s wife, Roseanne, is available if kids want to chat or chill out. 

The talk, which might involve music and a power-point presentation, is often held in the sanctuary. For many of the youth who have never been in a church before this “puts it up a notch. It’s pre-evangelism.”

Kendall recently retold the story of the Prodigal Son. One youth assured Kendall, “We love story-telling. It’s still cool.” And to his surprise the group is pushing for a retreat.

Fortunately, besides his rector, Kendall can draw on the Oakville Youth Network, an informal group of Christian youth leaders in the community who share what works for them and what doesn’t.

Last year Charbonneau assured Kendall that kids will begin making spiritual inquiries with time and as relationships build. This past year is bearing fruit. Two young people have approached Kendall saying, “We’ve got to talk.”  One said, “I need to get back to God” and has started coming to church regularly.   

Kendall enjoys discipling individual youth in these one-on-one conversations over coffee or pop. “It’s all about relationships” says Charbonneau.

Freebie Fridays run smoothly for the most part. Once, however, a car was stolen from a parishioner who ironically was praying in the chapel for the students. The robber crashed the vehicle while involved in a further crime and was jailed in the local youth detention facility—which church members also visit regularly.

Two parishioners meet weekly one-on-one with some of the incarcerated youth at the Syl Apps Kinarck Treatment Centre. And a monthly team from St Hilda’s led by Charbonneau and his wife Joanne hold a worship service in the prison chapel which about 15 to 25 young inmates attend. His sermons have to be really punchy and creative for this group—making addressing the Freebie Friday crowd and the Teen Thing group “a cinch.”