GCM campus church in Pittsburgh

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[tsessef]

It's almost "blitz" week for GCM/Collegiate churches. This is from the H2O Church in Pittsburgh, recruiting students to recruit freshman. Notice the manipulation. http://h2opittsburgh.org/mw18/

"The week officially kicks-off Sunday evening at 9 pm and runs through the end of the day Saturday, August 25. The most full days are Monday-Wednesday, with things tapering off significantly Thursday-Saturday. If you are unable to participate in something due to a prior commitment, please note it on your sign-up. If you can change that commitment, please make an effort to do so. Our goal would be for you to be able to participate in all the activities." (The bold and underline was theirs  )

Those last two sentences.  

[Rebel in a Good Way]

And they want you to pay to participate, lol!  Pay for a t-shirt to market us, pay for snacks for sustenance for all of your free labor and recruitment efforts.  Team building activity--well, I guess you get a short break from helping 

"Cost

The cost for the entire week is $25 and includes:

Snacks during several of our times together
A t-shirt
A special team building event
 
If you have any trouble with covering this cost, please email ______"

[DarthVader]

Not to be defensive (I have not shirked at all from criticism of my church) but I was very engaged in a campus church in college (University Baptist Church, Univ of IL - oh so many years ago) and it does tend to be pretty intense in multiple college ministries around new student week/orientation and if you had replaced "H2O" with "Campus Crusade for Christ" or "InterVarsity" at the top of this flyer, I probably wouldn't think twice about it.  When I was in college, I found the InterVarsity folks to be a little aggressive in their recruiting and a bit of a closed off society as well.  Not saying any of the issues raised about GCX in general aren't real but if you look across multiple campus ministries that don't have the issues GCX does, you'll probably see similar recruiting/outreach tactics given all the competition for mind-share of the new & returning students with hundreds of organizations from GBLTQ to young Republicans trying to get students invested in them.

[Rebel in a Good Way]

Yeah, this is true.  And it all makes me a little nervous--young, vulnerable, inexperienced adolescents away from home in a strange place for the first time and all of these groups vying for influence.  It can be an exciting time to get connected to things that interest you, but it is good for young people to know about informed consent (is the group really what it says it is) and love bombing (often hides other motives).  There is a difference between welcoming/making yourself known and unethical recruiting.  Ethical persuasion.

I think some of us cringe at this in particular because we were involved in campus ministry and it became very unhealthy.  So, kids think they're just joining a Christian ministry and then it is a high-control, high-demand group (you know, like all of us who were taught and expected not to date and expected to babysit the pastor's kids and serve 4 nights a week, etc.). 

Not to be defensive (I have not shirked at all from criticism of my church) but I was very engaged in a campus church in college (University Baptist Church, Univ of IL - oh so many years ago) and it does tend to be pretty intense in multiple college ministries around new student week/orientation and if you had replaced "H2O" with "Campus Crusade for Christ" or "InterVarsity" at the top of this flyer, I probably wouldn't think twice about it.  When I was in college, I found the InterVarsity folks to be a little aggressive in their recruiting and a bit of a closed off society as well.  Not saying any of the issues raised about GCX in general aren't real but if you look across multiple campus ministries that don't have the issues GCX does, you'll probably see similar recruiting/outreach tactics given all the competition for mind-share of the new & returning students with hundreds of organizations from GBLTQ to young Republicans trying to get students invested in them.

[tsessef]

my post was about this effort to recruit student volunteers to do stuff for them. It was manipulative and an example of them using their authority over students for their purposes, and it's the norm among Collegiate/GCM. "If you have a commitment and can get out of it, please make an effort to do so." How is it someone's "goal" for their church members "to be able to participate in all the activities"?    

[Huldah]

"If you have a commitment and can get out of it, please make an effort to do so."

In other words, it's not important for students to be people of character who honor their commitments.

By the way,  I checked the schedule. There's absolutely nothing scheduled that week that strikes me as important enough for anyone to break their word for.

[Rebel in a Good Way]

Yes, this is highly problematic.

"If you have a commitment and can get out of it, please make an effort to do so."

In other words, it's not important for students to be people of character who honor their commitments.

By the way,  I checked the schedule. There's absolutely nothing scheduled that week that strikes me as important enough for anyone to break their word for.