The Philosophy of the Croissant: Keeping the Way Open for Young People Finding Faith
It’s a damp April evening in Amelia County, Virginia. A congregation of teenagers huddles together in a small meeting house, buried deep in the woods. I’ve been invited here by a friend, who confidently guides me into the main room, where everyone is sitting in a circle on the floor. I’m content with watching from the doorway, but as soon as I take off my shoes, someone shouts, “This is a donut! Make it a croissant!” At once, the circle shifts, and a wide gap is formed, offering plenty of room for us to join.
The “croissant” is one of the guiding tenents of the Baltimore Yearly Meeting (BYM) Young Friends — a youth group that explores Quaker practices through monthly conferences, which could easily be mistaken for weekend-long camping trips or slumber parties. Young Friends often remain active in the Quaker community as they grow up, enrolling at small liberal arts colleges and participating in volunteer work through organizations like the Quaker Voluntary Service (QVS).
This is how Justin Sykes, a friend I made through BYM, ended up in Atlanta. QVS, a program that now operates throughout several U.S. cities, originated in Atlanta and provides fellows with housing in exchange for work with local social change agencies. However, in an open letter to the public posted on its website last month, board members revealed that the Atlanta location would have to temporarily close. The letter cites “frayed … connections between current and recent fellows and younger applicants,” much of which was brought on by the disruption of the pandemic. But this can also be attributed to a larger, existential trend, one that transcends the impacts of COVID-19.
As a Pew Research Center study shows, younger generations are increasingly less religious than their elders, with fewer young Americans identifying with a specific faith than ever before. One in four adults under the age of 30 have no affiliation, compared to one in ten adults over the age of 60. What is driving young people away from traditional forms of worship, and what are they looking for instead?
In a Harvard journal on activity-based wellness, Tyler J. WanderWeele discusses how institutional communities challenge individuals to embrace long-term commitments and a healthy dose of discord. Relationships, especially those formed through large groups and shared experiences, reinforce a sense of visibility and belonging, as members constantly have to practice varying levels of conflict resolution to keep the entire congregation afloat. As such, affiliating oneself with a spiritual practice can promote “health, meaning and purpose, character and a sense of having good relationships.” When these characteristics are absent from an institution, it no longer functions as a community, and members become isolated.
In the weeks before Sykes decided to leave QVS, he felt closed off from other members of his community. The leader of his house enforced strict policies to prevent the spread of COVID-19, which began as suspicious inquires and snowballed into interrogative “Where were you last night?”s. There was an absence of trust, and while Sykes valued the relationships he formed with each individual in the program, he felt unsupported by the community as a whole.
“The irony is that the two people of color left,” says Sykes, referring to himself and another QVS fellow. The program prides itself on being an inclusive space, but Sykes says that when he spoke up about racism within the group, he was met with resistance. “Quakers try to show up and be supportive for other communities… It’s like the thought is there and the action isn’t always taken right, or it’s taken too slowly, or it’s still centering the white experience.”
Jared Sawyer Jr., a 24-year-old pastor, asserts that “a commitment to public service in your immediate community” is a vital characteristic of a church that retains its members. Sawyer, who began preaching shortly after he became a deacon at the age of 4, has no trouble identifying the needs of younger generations. Rather than solely focalizing the Christian gospel, he emphasizes the importance of person-to-person interactions and showing up for every member of his community when they need it most. Following the murder of George Floyd in 2020, Sawyer organized members of his church to ensure that they were present in the demonstrations that took place across Atlanta, offering comfort and advice to anyone who sought it.
“They hunger for a spiritual home but a home of true justice as well,” says Catherine Moore, the youth program coordinator for the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Atlanta. As a teenager, Moore realized that the church she had been raised in did not possess these characteristics, which was ultimately the reason she left. Moore sees that today’s youth are quick to identify performative activism and virtue signaling, and she came to recognize that she could not accept a spiritual community separate from justice.
As is true with most good things, the communities that last will be the ones that allow themselves to grow and respond to criticism. Dr. Don Davis, an associate professor of psychology at Georgia State University, hopes spiritual leaders comprehend the vast nature of their role. “They are part of a living and organic process. So, nothing is static. I think some ways of doing things will not survive, and we will see new ways of forming community that are contextualized to the way the world has changed and will continue to change.”
According to Moore, young people are uninterested in destination-centered theology; they long for interpersonal relationships to help inform their individual journeys and navigate a turbulent, complex world. Once young people are invited into a space that allows them to make mistakes, practice forgiveness and build a sense of fellowship, they will feel they truly belong.
In the age of digital consumption, there is an intrinsic hunger to feel seen and supported.
“If people seek to optimize trust, it will take them a long way,” says Davis. These points of entry must come as offerings, not as commands, whether it’s through the comfort of the person marching next to you or the friend who guides you to the edge of a croissant.
