I’ve always assumed that the more emotionally healthy people come from two-parent homes. People like me. I figured we two-parent kids, especially those of us who had stay-at-home moms, are the more confident, self-reliant ones.

So it was a bit disenchanting to read the article “Battle Lessons” in the January 17 New Yorker. The article talks about how officers in Iraq get the information they need, and focused a lot on protected websites and discussion boards they are using to share information. It was quite interesting. But the thing I’m referring to was just one paragraph early in the article. It talked about the ability of platoon and company commanders to take initiative and show creativity in unusual circumstances, noting that today’s Gen-X officers are proving far less rigid than officers of the baby boom (my) generation.

The article says Gen-X officers,often from single-parent homes or homes where both parents worked, “are markedly more self-reliant and confident of their abilities than their baby-boomer superiors.” That’s what Army surveys show. It also noted that Gen-Xers are “notoriously unimpressed by rank,” which Don Rumsfield discovered during that famous Q&A session with the troops. The Gen-Xers also, having grown up with the internet, find ways to network with their peers of equal rank without going through the chain of command, thereby getting information faster and from people actually doing it (rather than someone sitting at a desk at some military HQ).

The whole thing about single-parent kids and double-income-parent kids being more confident and self-reliant: it makes absolute sense, when you think about it. They had to fend for themselves, often. When problems arose, they couldn’t run to Mommy and Daddy, but had to figure things out on their own. So they gained confidence in their ability to take initiative and devise solutions. I never really had to do that, at least not until I headed off to college. Even now, I can still “run” to my parents. When one of them dies, I’ll discover a gaping hole in my life.

So I’m thinking–how does this apply to the local church? I suppose Barna has written a few books on this. I’m going to play Totally Amateur Church Growth Guy and dispense some pseudo-wisdomish implications.

1. We baby boomers are big on training, like church growth conferences and multi-year disicpleship courses in preparation for ministry and leadership. Maybe the Gen-Xers don’t need that. Give them a ministry situation and authority to act, and they can muster up the initiative and creative energy to make it work on their own. Not that training is bad. But why not unleash the “unprepared,” and let them learn on the job? Don’t under-estimate them.

2. People want input. We’ve known this for years, so it’s no big revelation. But if Gen-Xers aren’t so impressed with authority, and do have confidence in themselves, they won’t be as apt to stand at attention and salute decisions coming from the pastor or board. Top-down stuff will be questioned. Of course, we baby boomers started that ball rolling, since so many of us have as much or more education than the pastor. In earlier days, when the pastor was often the most-educated person in the congregation, people looked to him for answers. But now, even if the pastor has multiple doctorates, they won’t necessarily be impressed.

3. Gen-Xers will want to draw information from their peers, persons who also serve on the front lines, even if it’s in a totally different theater of action (like a different denomination). And with the internet, they have the know-how, plus the built-in initiative, to find answers on their own. Today’s volunteers won’t necessarily run to the pastor with questions for which he may only be able to provide a canned answer (like how to run a worship team, how to deal with a suicidal youth, etc.). The information they need is out there, and they know how to find it.

It kind of makes me look differently at some of the young people in my congregation, people who may not have the advantage of college education, and who I may underestimate because they come from “troubled” family situations. It may be that these people have enormous untapped potential. As the Army is learning.