{"id":494,"date":"2012-03-01T12:00:45","date_gmt":"2012-03-01T17:00:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/practicalmattersjournal.ecdsdev.org\/?p=494"},"modified":"2015-09-03T09:17:12","modified_gmt":"2015-09-03T13:17:12","slug":"finding-god-in-the-graffiti-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pmcleanup.ecdsdev.org\/2012\/03\/01\/finding-god-in-the-graffiti-review\/","title":{"rendered":"Finding God in the Graffiti: Empowering Teenagers Through Stories"},"content":{"rendered":"
Download PDF:\u00a0RV Neville, Finding God<\/a><\/h5>\n
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\u00a0By Frank Rogers, Jr.
\nCleveland, OH: The Pilgrim Press, 2011. 212 pages. $24.00.<\/h3>\n
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The fourth title in the\u00a0Youth Ministry Alternatives<\/em>\u00a0series from Pilgrim Press, this new book from Frank Rogers, Jr., professor of Spiritual Formation and Narrative Pedagogy at Claremont School of Theology, argues convincingly for the need to apply the power of narrative to engage adolescents and young adults in creatively imagining and encountering the transformative power of the divine. Rogers describes the techniques he utilized in a number of youth theater and storytelling workshops as part of an innovative and experimental pilot program sponsored by the Narrative Pedagogies Project; this book represents the practical and theoretical conclusions Rogers developed out of that work. As Rogers writes, \u201cthe drama program hoped that the teens\u00a0would<\/em>\u00a0find God \u2013 that within the tangle of plotlines playing out in young people\u2019s lives, the movements of God would be discerned, along with the sacred story God aches to craft within the stories of our lives\u201d (2). Rogers\u2019 improvisational theater and writing exercises probed participants\u2019 \u201csubterranean concerns,\u201d encouraging each young person to identify a particular crisis (of faith, family system, or personal identity) and articulate both the crisis and its potential for resolution through movement, voice, and narrative.<\/p>\n

Rogers is an impassioned champion for the power of narrative; for him, story \u201chas the ability to reveal the most vital longings that pulsate in people\u2019s lives and souls, to communicate the cherished wisdom of our religious and cultural communities, to foster reflection on how the narratives of our lives intermingle with the narratives that ground our faith, and to inspire people to journey toward hope as empowered agents of healing in our world\u201d (2). As a book on narrative, each chapter begins decorously with a story-like recounting of an episode from the author\u2019s experience with teens. These stories, which are often quite touching, serve to anchor the theoretical discussion that follows in the actual practice of storytelling, such that the reader\u2019s overall impression of the book is one of overlapping layers: stories from Rogers\u2019 own experiences envelop his theoretical and practical arguments with lively efficiency. This \u201cfirst narrative, then theory\u201d structure works well for the book, although some narratives serve as more effective introduction points than others.<\/p>\n

The first chapter, \u201cHow do stories transmit a faith tradition? Narrative pedagogy and religious literacy,\u201d begins with a deeply moving account of a youth stage production of an original play about the narratives of key figures in African American cultural history. Titled, \u201cFreedom Train,\u201d this production gave African American youth the opportunity to honor a retiring pastor by crafting a dramatic narrative that intimately connected their church and the anxieties of twenty-first century youth to the great \u201cwisdom speakers\u201d and sacred stories of Civil Rights history. Here Rogers argues convincingly that \u201cstories are an unusually effective way to communicate a religious heritage\u201d (34), for the very process of identity construction within a faith community is itself immersed in sacred narratives that claim unique transformative potential and institutional authority. Religious institutions are themselves constituted by narrative, for the story of a particular community of faith both shapes and conditions the experience of participants – a complex process that Rogers glosses over by simply noting that \u201ccommunities\u00a0are<\/em>\u00a0stories,\u201d for a \u201cfaith tradition is not known when its theological doctrines can be articulated, nor when its ethical precepts can be distilled\u201d (37), but rather when its \u201ccanonical stories\u201d are so absorbed that they become the foundation of religious identity. Here Rogers makes something of a jump; he seems to say that a faith tradition is unintelligible\u00a0except<\/em>\u00a0through narrative (a point that may run counter to the experience of the more systematically-minded theologians among Rogers\u2019 reading audience). Nevertheless, Rogers\u2019 main thesis in this chapter \u2013 that young people must be invited to interact creatively with the narratives of their tradition to make them their own \u2013 is a course well-taken (although perhaps well-traveled).<\/p>\n

The second chapter tackles the question of the influence of narrative in the crafting of personal identity. Rogers\u2019 theoretical analysis is particularly astute here; his interlocutors range from narrative theologians Stanley Hauerwas and George Stroup to (somewhat controversial) child psychologist Richard Gardner. Here Rogers points with great nuance and practical clarity to the liberative potential of Christian narrative for young people, advocating for an approach that helps adolescents and young adults to \u201cfind their place\u201d within the narratives of their religious tradition by using storytelling to discern, claim and articulate personal identity.<\/p>\n

Rogers\u2019 third chapter attempts to articulate how narrative may stimulate the contemplative dimension of youth spirituality, but here the result seems focused more on the potential of psycho-drama as a tool best suited for accessing deep emotive expression rather than contemplation per se. It is in this chapter that Rogers tackles questions of human suffering, using Bibliodrama and creative, physical dramatic gestures to access young people\u2019s frustrations with the silence of God and the inadequacies of religion. For Rogers, \u201c[t]he liminal space of the imagination is where the sacred resides\u201d (81), and the author\u2019s description of a moving and powerful experience with teens who crafted a narrative that challenges God in the face of suffering is impressive proof that psycho-narratives which articulate young people\u2019s frustration can have the potential to introduce hope, simply by creating space enough for young people to be heard. But is this truly contemplation? Rogers asserts that \u201ccontemplative encounter narrative pedagogy facilitates an existential experience of the underlying realities embedded within a sacred story\u201d (81), yet the techniques and examples offered here inhere more to a kind of narrative approach to naming points of existential struggle rather than a contemplative program for encountering the divine\u00a0per se<\/em>. In particular, the use of narrative seems slightly at odds with the emphasis often placed in the Christian tradition on the apophatic or wordless quality of contemplative (or \u201cmystical\u201d) encounter. Nevertheless, there is great potential here for helping young people to imaginatively access the emotional depths of existential crisis and to move beyond points of despair in a hopeful, transformative way.<\/p>\n

The fourth chapter gives a particularly engaging account of the ways in which narrative may be used to engage young people\u2019s critical consciousness. Here Rogers\u2019 narrative-theoretical approach truly shines: the chapter opens with a description of \u201cTerrorists in Heaven,\u201d a production in which young people dramatically envisioned an afterlife that brings together figures from Islam and Christianity and explores the humanity common to both. Rogers then moves to an insightful discussion of the theoretical and practical mechanisms for using storytelling to help young people excavate and understand the layers of unwitting enculturation into which they have been submerged by society. Rogers\u2019 acknowledgement that \u201ccultural and religious narratives often enculturate in oppressive and destructive ways\u201d (109) sets the stage for insightful, practical suggestions for helping young people to deconstruct toxic ideologies, assumptions, and subliminal religious and cultural messages.<\/p>\n

The use of narrative to embolden what Rogers calls \u201ccreative vitality\u201d in young people forms the focus of the fifth chapter. Here Rogers is at his most poetic and theological: the chapter can hardly contain the author\u2019s wonder and thanksgiving for human creative potential, crafted in the image of God as Creator. The author\u2019s passionate advocacy for narrative\u2019s potential as an art form that transforms both its performers and audience bursts with exuberant clarity from every page. For Rogers, storytelling\u2019s power is precisely in its potential to help its participants come alive to their own experiences, so that they may engage the process of meaning-making and thus take greater ownership in the crafting of unique self-expression and individual personhood. Even general educators will find the fifth chapter\u2019s emphasis on the art of storytelling accessible, and Rogers\u2019 practical suggestions for crafting narratives for a \u201cstorytelling event\u201d promise useful potential for youth leaders of any religious tradition.<\/p>\n

The sixth chapter demonstrates the ways in which stories have the power to inspire youth to work for social change. Rogers grounds his pedagogical discussion at the intersection of liberation theology, Paulo Friere\u2019s liberatory philosophy of education, and Augusto Boal\u2019s Theater of the Oppressed. Specific practical suggestions for dramatic \u201cwarm-up\u201d exercises for a youth group come directly from the traditions of improvisational theater; narrative exercises that explore space, story, and gesture are heavily indebted to Boal. Precise mechanisms for helping students transition from narratives of societal transformation in a workshop or theater setting to taking initiative as agents of actual change in the world are left to the imagination of the reader.<\/p>\n

Throughout the book, Rogers\u2019 prose demonstrates the craft of a lively storyteller; it is bold and even, at times, rhapsodic, although not without a few accidental missteps. For example, a young adolescent with special needs is described as having a \u201cPillsbury doughboy physique\u201d and as \u201cbobbing\u201d his head in rhythm to his steps \u201clike a bobblehead doll\u201d \u2013 an unintentionally cruel set of descriptors that, while vivid, relegate this individual boy\u2019s particular disabilities or developmental issues to the realm of disposable cultural tropes. Overall, Rogers excels in relating with dramatic immediacy the personal experiences of a racially and ethnically diverse group of young people; indeed, one of the book\u2019s key strengths is in the diversity of cultural narratives that it sets forth as examples.<\/p>\n

Each chapter concludes with five \u201ceducational movements\u201d that clearly articulate the goals and processes of Rogers\u2019 narrative pedagogy. The book therefore steers deftly between rigorous theoretical exposition and extremely practical suggestions for concrete exercises without becoming too theory-heavy or assuming an unreasonable level of access to specific resources. Although Christian youth ministers would be the most obvious reading audience, the book will benefit anyone who works with adolescents and young adults or who shares in the responsibility of helping young people to grow into mature, healthy, spiritually-connected adults (and in this sense, it may stimulate the interest of Sunday School personnel, church councils and vestries, and senior pastors, rectors, elders and presbyters in addition to youth ministry staff). In particular, the specific techniques and practices described at the conclusion of every chapter have the potential to benefit youth workers from a variety of institutional settings; therapists, pastoral counselors, and workshop leaders will find much food for thought and many suggestions for productive group work and creative exercises.<\/p>\n

<\/h4>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Download PDF:\u00a0RV Neville, Finding God \u00a0By Frank Rogers, Jr. Cleveland, OH: The Pilgrim Press, 2011. 212 pages. $24.00. The fourth title in the\u00a0Youth Ministry Alternatives\u00a0series from Pilgrim Press, this new book from Frank Rogers, Jr., professor of Spiritual Formation and<\/p>\n

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