Hi folks, I’m Stephen

I was born in Belfast, Northern Ireland, the youngest of six children. Born in 1989, I experienced both the last internet-free childhood and the first internet-filled adolescence.

For ten years, I led a great youth work charity, supporting teens in working class housing estates. Before that, I worked in a strange sounding marketing team called ‘demand stimulation’ in one of the big broadband companies. Currently, I produce documentaries for charities, enjoy life in the North Coast with my wife Sharon and three children – and among other things, write here.

My writing flows from all of these experiences, and also from my Christian faith.

Of God and Young Men is all about the formation of boys into good men.

Here’s my concern: our moral and spiritual development is not keeping pace with the rate of technological acceleration. Materially, we have never been so prosperous, but our inner life has never been so shallow and frail.

The fact that one in five young people supposedly have a mental health problem is one indicator of this. That boys are demoralised and disengaging from society is another.

I am trying to understand the crisis of formation caused by digital technology and modern culture, and I want to articulate a Christian vision of formation. That is, how do we raise (or become) good men in the modern world?

As I have attempted to get my head around the subject of raising young men, I have felt overwhelmed by the potential strands of thought and the avenues for exploration. There is so much to consider.

There are theological or pastoral questions: What does it mean to live well as a human? What does the good life look like? How has secularism affected the way children develop? What kind of adults are cultivated in a materialistic society? How can families and churches work together to raise wise and virtuous young men?

There are philosophical and sociological questions: What kind of people is our education system cultivating compared to that of previous generations? What are the implications of family breakdown or a shift in social norms? Why is there a mental health crisis among the young? What is the impact of technology – of the internet, social media, AI? Why are young adults waiting longer and longer to marry and have children? What is the role of schools, the church, youth workers, parents, the state? Have there been golden ages in history when boys thrived? Who have been the great thinkers on education and formation? And what can we learn from them?

Then there are the practical and pedagogical questions: how can I best encourage growth and maturity in the boys right in front of me? What environment best promotes the flourishing of boys into good men?

Hopefully, we can tackle some of this!

Note: This newsletter was previously called Rethinking Youth