© 2006 Gina Buselli
© 2006 The Urantia Book Fellowship
As a “young” person in the Urantia community, I have made several observations about its growth over the years, and have watched new people be introduced to the book.
I was never formally introduced to The Urantia Book. As a second generation reader, it has always just been in my life. My parents hosted regular Friday night meetings at our home in Raleigh, North Carolina in the early 1980s. My earliest memories of the word “Urantia” equated with trying to remain quiet with my brother while playing video games on our Colleco Vision game set as the adults read in the adjacent room. I also remember my Thought Adjuster party with my family and the Raleigh group in 1983. Even though I was too young to understand the complexity and depth of its meaning, I knew I was part of something special and my childish thoughts and feelings were heard and recognized.
A couple of years later we relocated to Indianapolis and my parents once again became actively involved in the local Urantia community, hosting meetings at our home and attending conferences. Society had outgrown Colleco Vision, so during the meetings my brother and I turned our attention to the latest video game technology, Nintendo. I would occasionally sit in and listen to the discussions, liking what I was hearing and wanting to know more.
When I was fifteen, I started reading some of the papers on my own and the following year asked my parents for my own Urantia Book. My parents never forced me to read The Urantia Book; they left it there for me to discover and decide independently if the teachings were something I wanted to study and pursue. I looked forward to attending conferences, but the elation was always dampened when I was unable to find young adults or even other teen-agers at the local, regional, and international conferences. For a few years I thought my brother (he became an active reader of the book as well) and I lived in a relatively isolated world. I went to IC ’96 in Flagstaff and when I attended workshops I was dismayed to find that the people there closest to my age were 25 years my senior.
In early 1999, as I was finishing my senior year of college, I was contacted by a prominent young reader who was attempting to form an active network of young Urantia Book readers. At the next IC in Vancouver, I was happy to meet many fresh, new faces and be part of a seemingly growing community. By IC ’02, however, my enthusiasm had waned considerably and for the first time I spoke openly to several young adult readers there who had the same concerns. The questions and frustrations I had in 2002 are the same ones I have now. Where are all the young adult readers? What are the good things that are happening? What was going wrong within the community? What is the future of the young adult community?
The Urantia community is truly a microcosm to the macrocosm of society today. I will discuss positives and negatives that impact the young adult Urantia community and will discuss personal experiences both disturbing and hopeful and offer some suggestions on what can be done from this point.
In the Urantia community, like the remainder of society, one of the best things about young people is their high level of energy and ability to be sponges for new information. In this age of increased spirituality, young people are constantly seeking options and alternatives for spiritual growth and contentment. Most people I have met are very open-minded and optimistic about the future. Currently, in the young adult Urantia Community there is a tremendous interest in wanting to do the will of God. Many young adults today are erudite, intellectually capable individuals who are looking for increased wisdom.
Young people involved with The Urantia Book have also had opportunities to travel, introducing the book and community involvement to different people in many different areas. Currently, the UB Youth group holds annual tours, and attends local, regional, and international conferences, camping trips, and retreats. This is an excellent way to form relationships and keep active in the Urantia community. Holding strictly “youth” conferences also helps in maintaining a core youth unit. E-mail and the internet are indispensable tools that assist in communication and organization of travel opportunities. They are also excellent ways to find new, fresh connections. The establishment of the UBYouth website (ubyouth.org) has been great.
Overall, the young adult Urantia community has potential, yet it has been examined with praise and criticism from other young readers and “older” readers. I have been approached by these “older” readers at various times. Many have wondered what they have done to fail the younger generation and what they can do to help.
While young individuals possess tremendous energy, it is likely to be erratic and unstable. Young people are simply trying to figure out who they are and what they like. I know many twenty-somethings who have bounced from job to job trying to figure out what to settle into, what career to choose. Bouncing around from employer to employer or traveling around the country on book tours and retreats exemplifies an instability and refusal to plant real roots. This has been a complaint within the Urantia community regarding the younger people.
The emotional closeness of the younger readers can have drawbacks as well. While it promotes unity, it can also become so exclusive to only certain close “friends” that it actually has the opposite effect of its original intent. It could become so cliquish that new young people may feel rejected if their personalities and life experiences don’t fit the exact mold of the core group. A few years ago, I spoke with a couple of young Urantia Book readers and discovered they had no interest in being a part of the UB Youth organization due to “aimless wandering” of the then-current group and the partying with illegal substances. These were young, highly educated, and responsible individuals with great potential and they got lost in the shuffle. Another second-generation young adult in the southwest portion of the United States decided not to pursue further involvement with the group for the same reasons.
What is wrong here? Why are young people becoming discouraged and wanting nothing to do with the image of the Urantia community? This is significant because when a young person comes to this community hungry for spirituality, truth, and God, and walks away shaking his or her head for any reason, then there has been a catastrophic failure in the development of the Fifth Epochal Revelation. The numbers of discouraged young people may be small, but they may be larger than anyone has imagined. There is simply no way to tell.
Overall, I see my generation in today’s society lacking a drive and passion for get-your-hands-dirty hard work. In July 2005, I visited an old gymnastics coach and spoke to her at length about what I have been doing over the years. During the conversation she said, “Your generation was the last of the machines. If I told you to do a thousand push-ups you went to the corner and did them. I tell kids now to do ten push-ups and they roll their eyes and walk away. None of them want to work. None of them understand consequences.” When I trained there years ago that tiny hole-in-the-wall gym helped to produce NCAA All-American gymnasts, state and regional champions, and a 1996 Olympic gold medalist. It was growing up in that environment that made me love hard work. This still transforms my life today. Even though I struggled for the first few years after college, I now put in 40-60 hour weeks, sometimes working a third shift job on top of my normal day job. (This is one reason for my absence in the Urantia community.) As a result, I’ve accomplished a life-long dream of becoming a professional competitive dancer as well as a teacher, choreographer, entrepreneur, and marketing assistant for our studio.
Many young people I talk to, both inside and outside the Urantia community, have great ideals; however, they lack the serious drive and mental wherewithal to accomplish goals they set. Not enough young people I know value or love get-your-hands-dirty hard work. Are there young people who do like to work hard? Absolutely. Are there enough of them? No.
There is also a great deal of irresponsibility. At a past conference where I was conducting a workshop, I was encouraged by a highly respected young adult reader to skip or “just not show up” at my scheduled time so I could hang out and party with the young people instead. I was appalled at the request. Don’t get me wrong. I love to have fun and party (after all, I work in a cut-throat, late-night-partying professional Latin/Ballroom dance industry) but not when a pre-arranged obligation comes first. Consequently, I skipped the youth party and held my workshop.
Yet is this display of irresponsible behavior really all that far removed from young adults in society today? I don’t think so. Along with the job-hopping, more and more young adults are choosing to stay at home longer before moving out on their own. Are reasons strictly to save money and relieve financial stress? Or do young adults want the financial freedom to live more comfortably and fear the struggle of living independently? Are parents equally to blame by allowing this to happen?
Over the past few years, I have been approached by older generation Urantia Book readers about what they can do to give my younger, wetter-behind-the-ears generation the motivation and inner fire to do more in the organizations. After thinking for a long time, I could give only one answer, both frustrating and opaque: absolutely nothing. No person can give a fire or a flame to someone who refuses to take it. It’s not that this generation is devoid of passion and fire to succeed. Not all young adults are irresponsible and/or financially spoiled. This community is also not finding enough younger members because it is looking in too many wrong places too often. So where should the Urantia community be looking for fresh, new faces?
Colleges and universities.These are hotbeds for academic-oriented individuals who are accomplishing goals through action and purpose. Focus should not solely lean to students in philosophy and science fields, but rather a broad spectrum including nursing, medicine, business, communications, education, and any other service-oriented field that deals directly with people and social interaction.
Twenty- and thirty-something single people who are living on their own and financially independent, holding steady jobs, building solid careers, and have plans to marry and start families. It is crucial that these individuals have access to financial assistance to attend conferences.
Young married couples and couples with young children. This stresses the most important foundational unit in The Urantia Book, the family. It is also crucial for young families to have financial assistance to attend and participate in conferences.
Financial assistance is so important because starting careers and families is incredibly expensive. Many prospective and current readers have had to miss out on conferences due to the financial struggles of raising children and building careers. This community can no longer allow this to happen if it wants a younger population. I have not been able to attend many conferences myself due to tremendous financial struggles and very little paid time-off from work.
Despite all these drawbacks and unsettling statements, there are many positive things on the horizon. At IC ’05 I spent some time at the Jerusalem Marketplace simply observing the children, envious that this had yet to be invented when I was that age and tagging along with my parents at conferences. Their curiosity and level of intelligence was astounding. I really hope they continue learning and exploring. There is great potential for that generation to be wonderful torchbearers of the Urantia flame. Hopefully, my generation will truly grow up by accepting leadership roles, responsibilities, and direct this up-and-coming generation. I feel optimistic about the future. I continue to learn and meet new people, even if I feel on the outside of two bubbles: the “younger” Urantia community and the “older” one.
Lastly, I hope to embrace other individuals who perhaps feel too old to be part of the “youth” Urantia community and too young to be in the “older” generation; the type of generation that is simply “adult.”
Gina Buselli is twenty-nine years old. When she is not teaching dance, she enjoys writing, shopping, and spending time with friends and family.
The contact of the mortal mind with its indwelling Adjuster, while often favored by devoted meditation, is more frequently facilitated by wholehearted and loving service in unselfish ministry to one’s fellow creatures.…The soul of man requires spiritual exercise as well as spiritual nourishment. [UB 91:7.1-2]