During this week, a small group of people from all regions gather here in Geneva to talk about a handbook on diakonia. Diakonia is a Greek word and means “service”. In the New Testament, it is often used when Christian love becomes practical. Acts 6 tells the story from the first church in Jerusalem calling “deacons” in order to care and to support the sick, the poor and the widows. Therefore, “diakonia” means the social action of the church.

I was asked to present in that meeting the role of youth in diakonia. On the one hand, I recalled some of the serious challenges young people are facing. In my analysis, the vast unemployment is the most pressing issue:

“The youth unemployment rate, a measure of the percentage of young people who are looking but unable to find work in the youth labor force stood at 13.5 per cent in 2005″ⁱ. Compared to 6.4% for the overall global unemployment rate. The difference to the adult population is even rising. 85 million youths are unemployed. 300 Million are “working poor” defined as earning less than USD 2 a day. That is about half of the employed youths.

International Labor Organization. 2006. Youth Employment Trends 2006, Geneva, p. 4

The problem is really vast and it is pivotal: If you have a job you can solve many other problems much better.

But something else is even more important:

Churches ought to discover youth not so much as a problem but as an asset. Young people can and should be the ones who affect the changes that we need. There are very encouraging signs especially in volunteerism. Many young people are open and happy to volunteer their service for fixed time. There are many million young people who do that.

The church should be part of this movement and make good offers to young people to volunteer. This also includes giving youth-led movements space so that they can be part of the church and collaborate in diakonia.

If you are interested even more, you can read the paper that I presented: Youth and Diakonia