Overview

Empower LGBTQIA youth in your church with the help of practical guidance, compassionate care, and fresh insights designed to build affirming, supportive faith communities. Despite our best efforts to create welcoming and affirming congregations, the reality is that church can still be a harmful place for LGBTQIA youth. A Brief Guide to Ministry with LGBTQIA Youth, Updated Edition helps pastors and church leaders reflect on the various trials that adolescence brings for LGBTQIA youth and understand how an affirming stance toward LGBTQIA people can positively affect the day-to-day experience of teenagers in a church setting. This newly updated resource provides insight and practical advice for important questions like: How can a pastor, youth minister, or volunteer embrace, nurture, and provide skillful care for LGBTQIA youth in a congregation or community? How can we encourage LGBTQIA teens who want to fully live out their Christian faith and their gender identity or sexual orientation? How should I respond to parents who are anxious or unwilling to support their LGBTQIA children? New to this edition is a chapter on the intersections between LGBTQIA identity and neurodivergence, and extra attention to how churches can respond to the assault on diversity and transgender rights in the current political climate. An updated glossary of terms and list of national and local resources that can be used to support LGBTQIA youth are also included.

Full Product Details

9780664269418

Table of Contents

Reviews

""This guide is essential reading for anyone who works with young people and seeks to approach questions of gender and sexuality from a place of wisdom and care. With a warm, narrative voice, Cody Sanders weaves compelling real-world case studies, important research and statistics, local and national resources, and practical guidance. This updated edition speaks directly to our current tumultuous political moment and offers vital new insights into the intersections of gender, sexuality, and neurodiversity."" --Keith A. Menhinick, Lecturer in Religious Studies, Affiliate Faculty in Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, Georgia State University ""The world needs this book. It is thoughtful and informative and expertly explores the nuance of faith, humanity, identity, and the current political climate. Sanders has updated the original to reflect the ever-expanding landscape of the LGBTQIA community and the importance of allyship in today's world. This book will (once again) be an invaluable, lifesaving resource."" --Pepa Paniagua, Coordinator for Innovation and New Ministry Development, Grace Presbytery ""Informative, vast, and practical, Sanders's work is so necessary for our world right now. This is a tremendous resource for ministry staff and laypersons seeking to better understand and support some of our most vulnerable young people--whether you're part of a faith community that is already fully open and affirming or whether you're an ally trying to provide a safe space in one that isn't there just yet."" --Becky Schroeder, Youth Minister, Middletown Christian Church, Louisville, Kentucky

Author Information

Cody J. Sanders is Associate Professor of Congregational and Community Care Leadership at Luther Seminary. An ordained Baptist pastor, he has previously served as a chaplain at both Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, pastor to Old Cambridge Baptist Church in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and as a faculty member at Chicago Theological Seminary and Chaplaincy Study Center. He is a respected leader regarding LGBTQIA concerns in the field of pastoral theology and is the author or coauthor of many books, including Queer Lessons for Churches on the Straight and Narrow and Microaggressions in Ministry.

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