By Mary Lackie

Teen-agers looking for a cause should be given an effective voice in Church activities, said the Rev. Bruce Donnwally, Methodist chaplain of the 12th Gate Coffee House.

Donnelly was guest speaker at a “Youth Out,” sponsored by the Council of Catholic Youth at St. Joseph’s Church, Marietta. “I work with kids who are walking symbols. They wear beads, sandals, medals around their necks, long hair. All are symbols to them, but I think the Cross is about the only symbol left that is meaningful. It describes the whole process of life: birth, death, crucifixion, resurrection. What symbols do you need in your life as a student?” he asked.

In answer to the question, how do teen-agers express themselves effectively? Donnelly said, “You put them down in a dimly-lit coffee house and they open up. Most kids are put in a bare meeting room with white walls, and they won’t talk. The freely structured atmosphere of a coffee house offers a beautiful medium for kids who want to talk.” Among common discussion topics at the coffee house are the use of symbols and new forms of liturgical worship.

Donnelly said, “Kids are looking for creativity and we have to channel this creativity in a newly creative way. I think one reason the Christian Church is where it is today is because the worship service is not meaningful. When you go to worship, the drama you act out is not meaningful to you the rest of the week.” Donnelly stressed the need for teen-agers to be given an active part in the Church, not just appointed to committees that decide color schemes. He said, “When I say the young people should ‘take over,’ I mean if you give them something important to do, they will be there. We also need the wisdom and maturity of adults working along with us. You don’t have to understand kids, you just need to have an open mind.”

In a brief talk on liturgical changes, Father Henry Gracz priest-secretary of the Archdiocesan Liturgy Commission asked, “Why is it that sometimes you can go to a large church or a small one and have no experience of community or even worship, yet on other occasions the people assembled are really alive and united?”

A teen-ager commented, “If the liturgy is dead, we have made it dead. We need core groups working in the parishes to make the liturgy relevant and to bring the people together.”

An experiment in ‘tactility’ brought the groups together in what the priest described as a psychological experiment to meditate, communicate and create community and a sensitivity to each other.”

The afternoon ended with an outdoor Mass. Members of the group prepared the altar for the celebration of the Eucharist and participated in a dialogue homily.

The “Youth Out” was one in a series of St. Joseph’s CCY programs, said Nick Petty, sponsor. Father James McGoldrick, S.M., assistant pastor of St. Joseph’s Church is moderator for the group.