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Wednesday
3 December, 2008 |
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Feature Articles |
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Walking The Talk
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Wednesday,
16 June, 2004
Andy Bathgate, Chief Executive of SU Scotland, talks about his vision for the organisation and his motivation for sharing the good news, modelling faith and developing strong Christian leaders.
Question: Andy, it’s almost exactly three years since you took on the job of Chief Executive. What has been significant?
Andy: I was at Basecamp last summer and I think of it now as the best moment since I started. A group of extremely talented young people were together for leadership training, eager to receive teaching, keen to serve and serious about understanding Scripture. Several of them had come to faith through SU events. It was wonderful to see our staff operating in that environment, engaging with the young people and using their considerable talent. It was also a treat for me to present a whole week of Bible teaching with interactive feedback from the group. This event summed it all up. This was what I had signed up for!
And what’s at the top of the agenda just now?
Well, it’s not unrelated to that Basecamp experience. Recently, I’ve drawn a diverse group together from several Christian organisations to discuss how we can develop the training for leadership that we provide, in particular for young people. A lot of good things have been done in this area, but there is a need for a clearer strategy and more of a sense of connectedness. We want to see more young people come to faith and grow to become influential as leaders in a whole range of spheres.
More generally, a lot of the work that has been done around the organisation over the last year or two has been about putting the building blocks in place for growth. It was important to get the structures right so that staff will get the proper support, volunteers can be looked after and the appropriate legal framework is there. Changes in the management structure should make it possible for more successful ministry to take place as we look ahead.
So that’s what has been going on. We’ve been laying foundations that should make it possible for more Basecamp type events to happen. Young people go on from there and get involved in serving, and that’s exciting. If anything, I feel more envisioned than I did three years ago. I’ve also got to the point of understanding the complexities of the job. It used to seem relatively straightforward!!
Do you think Scotland is a tougher place for children and young people to grow up than it was a generation ago?
Undoubtedly it is. The vestiges of Christian ethos grow thinner all the time. Many of the young Christians that I speak to report the loneliness of standing up for their faith in the school setting, when even other Christian pupils and teachers prefer to keep their heads down.
I think some of our newspapers are particularly anti-Christian and the media generally contributes to the sense of our faith being marginalised. It’s not regarded as politically correct to be a Christian, and this can undermine people’s confidence to speak of Jesus as the only way.
So how can SU respond?
Evangelicals haven’t always been great at listening or exploring. Perhaps that is why we’ve ended up labelled as using the Gospel as a bit of a blunt instrument. I think SU can be helping young people to engage with the Bible with an open, questioning, exploratory attitude. As they grow in faith and confidence they will be able to get to know people and ask questions of them from a strong personal base rather than feeling on the back foot. This is not about watering down the message, more about understanding that we have to build relationships with people before we can introduce them to Jesus.
The other vital thing is this: we have to be modelling the Christian life. This is a hallmark of the SU approach and one of the reasons why residential events and holiday clubs are so important in our ministry. These are places where young people can see genuine, attractive holiness. They can see leaders engaging with Scripture and living it out around them. But even there we’ve been too happy teaching and preaching: communicating truth without making the extra effort to help show how to put it into practice.
To bring these two ideas together, we need to be listening carefully to young people, hearing what their needs are and responding by both telling and showing the gospel.
At the moment the churches in Scotland are struggling more and more to attract children and young people. Is SU tackling this issue?
There are no easy solutions or pat answers for this one. We struggle with the same issues ourselves and try to engage with churches at a local level. Many staff are involved in youth work in their local churches and many volunteers too. When young people respond to the gospel or express an interest in faith, we encourage them to find a local church and get involved. We’ve even been known to organise events that will introduce young people to their local church.
On the whole, however, churches aren’t listening enough to what young people are saying. I notice that young people do respond to people who show genuine interest in them, and will go to church, even if there isn’t trendy worship, if they are welcomed and made to feel at home. It’s not just about changing structures, but about having the courage to be interested in young people – offering time, hospitality and a listening ear. There’s a lot more listening that could be done!
Our new Student Exec provides valuable opportunities to listen to Christian young people, and this is beginning to have an influence on our approach.
So what are the issues that are shaping the direction of SU for the future?
There’s no sense in which we are planning to change course. We know that the organisation is here to bring the gospel to children and young people and to help everyone engage with the Bible. However, we do need to be continually evaluating how we go about this task. We need information about how our mission field is changing so that we can respond properly. For example, if 30% of Scotland’s children are living in poverty, are we active in reaching out to that sector? Young people with special needs is another issue close to my heart and I am asking if there is more we can do there.
As a movement we need to understand better how to help young people in a post-Christian environment to engage with the Bible, and we are considering commissioning some research that will help us to direct our efforts more effectively.
What roles will staff and volunteers play?
When I started I was certain that if ministry is to be relationally based then there is a need for more staff. The ES-team project in Edinburgh is the kind of approach that may become the model for the future, with staff covering a smaller local area and supporting each other as a team. This approach is not driven by a desire to grow, but simply by the theological point of view that ministry needs to be relational.
More staff would also mean further support for our volunteers, who are the very heartbeat of the organisation. We need to be equipping these people for service and providing the information, training, support and encouragement that they need to set up SU groups, run events, plan Holiday Clubs and volunteer for camps, to name but a few. We want to be an organisation that honours volunteers!
What current opportunities can we reach out for?
There is an interesting side affect of the McCrone agreement for teachers. Teachers are becoming entitled to more preparation time during the working week, and schools are looking at how to provide a curriculum that allows for this to happen. RME (Religious and Moral Education) is a subject area where schools may be interested in appropriate people coming in to assist. SU is clearly well placed to offer more in this area; it’s a large challenge on top of the many other areas that we are trying to tackle.
This is a complete aside, but I know you have an interest in art. Do you have a favourite picture?
Well, I’m not sure if it’s my absolute favourite, but I am amazed by a family portrait called William Chalmers-Bethune, his wife Isabella Morison and their Daughter Isabella. It was painted by David Wilkie when he was just 19 and shows an incredible psychological depth in the faces of the three characters. It wouldn’t be my favourite in terms of beauty, but for what it tells us about the relationships.
Art is an astonishing gift. I’m continually surprised that people should be able to communicate so much through colour and texture. Often there can be so many different layers to a work of art and you have to go back again and again to grasp something new or notice something that you’ve missed.
Finally, I guess it is not always easy being the Chief Exec. What keeps you going on the difficult days?
I think a lot of it is about perspective. Many of the things that we have to deal with on a day-to-day basis can feel important at the time, and indeed they are in some ways. However, when you consider things in the light of God and his eternal purposes, it can provide quite a different set of priorities. For me, daily Bible reading is about helping to keep that perspective right.
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First published in @SU, June 2004
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