The True Story of the Cat We Rescued…While At Work.

It’s a chilly fall day here–the kind of day that makes you want to curl up under a blanket with the cuddly dog (or cat) or your choice and watch a roaring fire.

This brought to mind a unique little drama that unfolded in our workplace a few years ago. Below is a dear little story, based on an excerpt of what I emailed to our staff back on a cold day so long ago:

Sit down, grab a cup of cocoa, and prepare yourself for tears of happiness with this story (ok, maybe tears only if you are a cat lover…..)

While half of the staff is gallivanting around the world on mission trips in Peru and Jamaica right now, the Hangar staff has been on the hunt for several days looking to find the source of some mysterious “meows” coming from the Hangar storage room.

It all started during an afternoon meeting in the Hangar, when I only partially listened to my coworkers and instead strained to hear a weak cry coming from the storage room in the back of our building. Fearing that I would be labeled a lunatic, I waited a full half an hour before stopping the group to say, “Do you guys hear that?”

They did. So we immediately started investigating.

After cracking open the door to the room and all definitely hearing a kitty plea for help (or attention–you know those darn cats, you can never quite figure them out), we snapped into action.

No, it’s not normal to have kittens in our youth building, just in case you were wondering.

We got down on our hands and knees and started crawling around with flashlights, dodging under printers, boxes, Christmas decorations, industrial tools, and killer dust balls the size of small cars until we discovered the source: a large gray and white cat, trapped in the storage room. We chased him around for quite some time, but weren’t able to catch him—he eventually climbed deep into the wall and stopped crying altogether.

We feared the worst. Freezing cold weather, nothing to eat but mouse poison….he could get into all sorts of trouble.

And, just like Poe’s character in The Tell-Tale Heart, we could hear nothing but his sad meows. That just doesn’t make for a good work environment.

Thinking quickly, we filled up a small bowl with water and lovingly left out the only food we could find in a pinch: a bag of Sun Chips.

We returned this morning to find the water and Sun Chips we left out for him gone. We found a can of tuna in the pantry (thank goodness for leftovers from my Double-Dog Dare youth event!), and eventually tempted him out with little bits of tuna. It was a laborious process, gaining the trust of this wily feline. It involved being very, very still…and very generous with placing bits of smelly fish on the floor all around us.

Slowly starve to death in THIS room? Not on our watch!

When we finally coaxed our furry friend out from behind the shadows of old office furniture, I slowly inched my long scarf off of my neck and patiently roped it into a makeshift lasso.

I know, you’re sensing a common theme here–thinking on the fly. It’s something that the Hangarites are used to.

In a flash, I wrapped my scarf around him and wrangled him out, then carried him to the Hangar office. We stuffed him into a cardboard box with large holes poked in the top, and sat there watching him like a kid watches a beetle trapped in a glass jar, all wondering the same thing: Now what?

We called countless vets and checked on Craigslist for lost cats, but couldn’t find anything that matched the description of this particular cat. After unsuccessfully trying to contain him in several boxes–as cats are more inclined to arch and pop the lid off of boxes that your typical well-behaved garden beetle–we got a small dog carrier from my apartment and brought him to the animal clinic right down the road.

We brought him in, and the receptionist proceeded to pull out a microchip detector. She cautioned us against hope, saying that cats are rarely ever microchipped. We held the kitty still as she waved the wand over him–and to our astonishment, our cat was indeed the proud owner of a tiny microchip.

The clinic’s receptionist pulled up the cat owner’s contact information from the microchip, called the cat’s owner, and we could hear the owner on the other line bawling as the receptionist explained how we had found the cat in our building. Apparently, the cat (named Paul) was a gift to her young son in April. In May, their neighbors were having some intense housework done (which involved jack hammers), and the cat got scared and ran away from their house on Baumgartner Road–a few miles away from our church.

After 8 months of being away from home, braving several months of winter snow,  the owners had written off their cat as dead. But upon hearing that their prodigal cat had turned up after all, the ecstatic owner rushed over to the clinic to pick him up right away.

So, while some of you have been witnessing in the slums of exotic third-world countries this week, the rest of us have been uniting a cat and family together in love.

I know…a tiny tear slipped out while you read that. It’s ok, go ahead and let it out.

I’ll try not to judge you for being a cat-lover.

The Penn State Scandal, from a Youth Leader’s Perspective…

To say that I’m horrified, sickened, and utterly appalled by the Penn State scandal that’s hit the news in the last few days would be an understatement.

Rarely do I feel compelled to personally respond to a woeful tale of news. But as someone who works with young boys and girls on a regular basis, spends time studying their psychology and understands how  fragile they are at this critical time in their lives–and has some idea of the extent of the damage that sick adults have inflicted on these kids will undoubtably cause–I can’t keep quiet.

I don’t have the desire to yet again sully the minds of good people by dredging up the details of horrific tale of heinous crime, cover-up, negligence, and unbelievable arrogance. Nor do I have the experience or degree necessary to analyze this like the legal experts and psychologists out there , who can articulate and explain much better than I can.

So I’ll speak from my gut, as a youth leader.

My heart absolutely goes out to the boys and families who are enduring humiliation, betrayal, and attempting to recover from the abuse of men that the world lifted up as heroes. I pray for their future, their ability to forgive, heal, and recover–but I know they can never forget what has happened to them.

I feel sick when I think about all the ways that the adults in this situation failed to protect innocent children. If this doesn’t demonstrate the old adage that “absolute power corrupts absolutely”, I don’t know what does.

It’s hard for me to fathom what went through the minds of those who realized that such atrocities were taking place with their co-workers, and how they justified not stepping in to call the police and pursue this doggedly until the appropriate people got locked up in jail. To be a program director or the president of a university, and to hear a hint that even smacked of sexual abuse of minors and to do nothing but bury it? And to honestly think that no one would ever find out?

I can’t possibly imagine walking into a locker room, witnessing abuse with my very own eyes, and not being sure about what to do. It’s unbelievable that a grown man could go home and eat dinner, get up in the morning and go about his normal daily habits without even pausing to consider what a fragile ten-year-old boy was going through at the same time. And to call daddy and ask for advice, instead of doing what was right and calling the police?

And to have your grown son call you for advice on this issue, and to not call the police yourself? To sit by and proudly watch your son succeed in his career by covering  up and protecting criminals–who continue to commit horrible acts on innocent young boys?

What’s more, I can’t believe the college students at Penn State who are rallying and rioting for this so-called “legendary” coach. Do these students have no semblance of right and wrong? Or are they so self-focused and arrogant (and likely intoxicated) that they can’t understand what evil has been committed here? (Hey, Penn State–ever take a history course? Young adults rallied and rioted like this for another guy–er, I think he went by the name “Hitler”? Ring a bell as another mistake that people once cheered for?)

Stories like these–and my ill-fated story of being attacked at Disneyland, which you can read here– sure illustrate how depraved our world is.

At the same time, it saddens me to hear things like I heard on the national news yesterday, as one expert talked about parents and students being wary about the adults in their lives. She cautioned against adults who talk to and hang out with youth, who spend time seeking to understand kids, who know what kids are into, who attempt to be a listening ear and caring adult to young people.

It’s not that I disagree–it’s just that she described me (and every other youth leader, pastor, Big Brother or Big Sister, and counselor) out there. And despite all the negative news about leaders and adults who do screw up, there are a lot of us faithfully working with kids–not because of some sick fetish or inner inadequacy or inability to grow up and get a “real job”–but because we know that investing in this upcoming generation is the most important thing we can do for our world.

In this horrific scandal, the “good adults” were the ones to distrust…the ones who twisted the truth and blatantly chose the path of no responsibility…the ones who looked out only for their own selfish gain and paid no attention to the lives of helpless kids. Only time can tell what sort of an effect that these fallen heroes might have on the way this entire generation of kids grows up to trust, behave, and believe.

And really, who can blame them?

Let’s instead pray that this generation rises above this sort of behavior and can set a better example of moral integrity, justice, and honesty to their children.

7 Observations about Today’s Middle School Kids…

I’m still recovering from our annual confirmation retreat, which was a few weekends ago.

Yes, still recovering. I’m old. My 26-year-old self can’t pull those all-nighters like I could just a few years ago in college.

Earlier this month, I spent my beautiful fall weekend running a huge retreat for our 7th and 8th grade students, at a camp about an hour and a  half away from our church. I spent pretty much the entirety of my waking moments meticulously running through checklists, transportation arrangements, schedules, songs, props, and handouts…not to mention constantly giving direction and instruction, problem-solving on the fly, breaking up rowdy fights between 7th grade boys, hugging crying girls, speaking and teaching, checking in with leaders and musicians and tech people, shouting through a megaphone, and acting as liaison between our group and the camp staff (translation = every time a kid wanted to go shoot arrows at the archery course, I had to stand and supervise to make sure no one came home missing an eye).

It was a great weekend. I managed to get about three whole hours of sleep each night in my room of non-stop hyperactive girls, I only got hit in the face with a dodgeball twice, and only one student dared pull a prank on my water bottle.

I use this time, each retreat, to scrutinize each wave of students. I love to learn their culture, their norms, and their group’s personality, as well as what they struggle with, what they need, and what they’re growing up to be.

Here are 7 of the observations I made about this particular generation of students:

• We are, without a doubt, seeing the impact of strictly scheduled kids who are completely immersed in technology. Kids don’t really know what to do with true free time. These kids are so used to being told what to do, every second of their day, that they don’t understand how to think on their own or structure their free time at all. They also wouldn’t stop asking about the schedule. It’s clear that they are used to keeping their own schedules and knowing what’s happening each day, and even though we told them “not to worry about the schedule”, they did.

• I think these kids crave a release from their technological world. We don’t hear many complaints about it not allowing cell phones at our retreat anymore, whereas it was a constant complaint just a few years ago. Kids seemed all too happy to be away from the “stress of keeping up with Facebook and their texts from friends”. I just wrote an article about this at my youth ministry column at thESource, if you want to dive into this topic more here.

• These kids are more noticeably distant from adults and older teenagers. Even our high school students, who helped out as leaders at one of these retreats for the very first time, noticed this and commented on it. Our middle school kids were polite, but distant. I wonder if this is a reaction to the fact that they are constantly ordered around by adults, with their highly structured teams, clubs, and other organizations—and deep down, maybe unknowingly resentful that these adults don’t care enough about them to force them to unplug, take downtime, and quit the activities that they can’t mentally and physically keep up with.

• This group of students is losing the ability to read and write at the level that should be standard for their age group. Many was very rudimentary in their ability to think critically, fill out answers, and spell. I know this is the generation that is the techie generation, and it’s clear to me that using autocorrect and not learning how to write things out by hand is eroding their ability to spell, construct sentences, and even their handwriting itself. I fear for their college professors–and the future of literature.

• Attention spans are getting shorter and shorter. The old adage I’ve heard that a student has about a minute of undivided focus for each year old they are (so, about 12-14 minutes at a time for these kids) seems to be shortening. They want everything instantly, and they get antsy even if they have to wait in line for something. They lose focus in the amount of time it takes to hand something out to their group.

• I think these kids are absolutely dying for individual attention. It’s a trademark of their age, of course, but it seems like even the smallest amount of personal, one-on-one time just completely lifts them up. One really cool thing we did this year was have all of our small group leaders pray individually with kids, while we were doing our closing worship service—so each student there was prayed for personally by an adult. Many kids were crying, even though most of the adults spent only a few moments praying with them. I wonder if this is another effect of them feeling like they are over-programmed and expected to produce results in most everything they do—that simply by having an adult love them, without expecting anything from them in return, is something they aren’t used to.

• At one point, when I told the entire room that we had had a prayer team of 80 people (including 60 teenagers who had gone on the retreat before), praying for them by name for the entire month of October, I saw jaws drop open. I think the idea of being a part of something that’s a legacy is something that’s important to this group–which makes perfect sense, because the technology they’re so used to is so temporary that they crave something that lasts for a long time. Kids were coming up to me and telling me they were excited to get to pray for this group when they became teenagers, and many were asking me if they could come back to the retreat as teen leaders in the future. I think this wave of kids will be very interested in their personal genealogies, and will be captured by the idea of being a part of something that’s bigger than themselves.

All observations aside, I need to add one purely emotional statement that comes straight from the gut:

I love these kids and leaders.

Even with the kids’ wild dodgeball-chucking energy, and that twinkling in their eyes that indicates that they just poured a cup of sugar into my ice water, and their insistence that we stay up “just a little bit longer” to tell stories in our room late at night, and our leaders’ good-natured assistance with pranks, stealing creepy dolls out of rooms when no one is looking, and hiding candy bars in their Bibles…they make retreats like this a blast.

And now, for the first time in weeks, I can relax…and leisurely sip my sugar-free water.