CaSE Program Description
CaSE 2013 is designed with the goal of making an impact on our homes, campuses, and cities by inviting small teams of pastors, lay leaders, and college students representing a handful of local churches to join together for a week of worship, teaching, collaborating, and prayer. We aim to create for a week what we’re calling a: “ministry studio”, a space and time where students and ministry leaders can both receive direction from God and begin working together on responding to him at different levels (ministry, campus, city).
Here’s what this will look like: while a good chunk of the week will be spent in worship, teaching from our keynote speaker and workshop leaders, small groups, and fellowship, we are also dedicating a portion of our time to what we're calling "FedEx Groups." These groups will be designed to facilitate times of collaborative listening and and responding to God among the students, responses that we envision to possibly involve new ministry initiatives and programs that take place once CaSE ends. We are aiming for CaSE to actually be the springboard for the development of a strong network of Christian college students and ministries.
Logistics
CaSE 2013 will take place at a comfortable retreat center located not more than 2 hours from Seattle (further details are forthcoming), from August 6th to August 9th, 2013. The registration cost will cover venue, food, and speaker, but getting to and from the center will be the responsibility of each participating church. We are seeking grant money in order to help provide scholarships, but we ask that any participants in extra financial need seek assistance from their own ministries first. Each participating ministry is being asked to bring one pastor or lay leader, and 2 to 4 student leaders. We will also have a few at-large spots open for students who don't have a pastor, and vice versa.
History of CaSE
CaSE began in 1999 under the auspices of the
National Council of Korean Presbyterian Churches
(http://gamc.pcusa.org/ministries/korean/about-us/), and the Office of Asian
American Leadership, both ministries of the General Assembly (PCUSA). It was
originally launched as the National Korean Presbyterian College Conference,
then was renamed the Korean American Student Empowerment Conference (KASE). The
conference was held every summer from 1999 to 2011, bringing together college
students from Korean American Presbyterian churches from around the country.
Though it began as a national conference for
Christian Korean-American college students, CaSE found itself constantly
attracting college-aged young adults of many different backgrounds. This year,
CaSE has changed the name of the conference to “Christian Student Empowerment”
in order to reflect the fact that non-Korean students are welcome to be fully a
part of what is happening at this gathering.
With that said, CaSE recognizes that certain
needs and topics that are specific to the Asian-American, bi-cultural ministry
context are not being addressed in other Christian leadership development
conferences and programs. These needs include two well-documented “silent
exoduses”: one that continues to occur among Korean-American youth raised in
Christian homes, and another that is occurring on a broader scale among all
American 18-30 year old Christians. CaSE
has served those unique needs well since its inception, and it is dedicated to
continuing to do so, particularly for college aged young adults in the
Northwest.
Purpose and Need
College is an incredible time of opportunity
and identity formation. Not only do young men and women begin to choose their
career paths during their time as college students, few other stages in life
offer them as much flexibility to explore their callings.
Yet as important and exceptional as this
stage of life is, for a variety of reasons it is also an especially challenging
time for students’ faith. Even though college is perhaps the most critical time
for students to be growing as disciples of Jesus Christ, it is precisely during
this time that their relationships with Christ seem to be the hardest to
maintain.
As was mentioned earlier, there are two well
documented “silent exoduses” that are challenging the movement of Christ in
North America among young people, and particularly Asian-American young people,
today. Young people, even those raised in the church, are less and less likely
to grow into their faith during their late teens and twenties. In
Asian-American churches this problem is exacerbated by the presence of
significant language and cultural barriers between them and their parents’
generation that make it harder for them to imagine what following Christ as an
adult might look like.
Unfortunately, for many churches it is
difficult to focus precious time and resources on college students. And while
there already exist excellent campus ministries such as InterVarsity, there
also exist various obstacles that keep some Christian students from joining
these ministries. This is not to mention the fact that not every campus has a
vibrant campus ministry present.