Students at a Young Life event in Henry County celebrate their team’s victory in a scavenger hunt. Chris Tatom, a 2014 graduate of Greenfield-Central High School, wants to launch Young Life here.
Photo provided
GREENFIELD — Chris Tatom went away to college in Ohio. He was an intern at a church in Pennslyviania. But Greenfield never left his thoughts.
“Greenfield kept coming back to my heart and into my mind,” he said.
During his college years, Tatom volunteered with a Young Life group and saw how impactful the organization’s sense of community and adult mentoring were in the students’ lives. Now he hopes to launch such a group in Greenfield. He envisions a place where all kinds of youth find a warm welcome and caring adult role models — a Christian setting, but not tied to any one church.
Tatom said he’s seen Young Life be an approachable place for teens who might not be connected with a youth group or church. Its weekly club meetings have food, music, dancing and a short — maybe five minutes — presentation of a Gospel message.
“The thing I love most about Young Life is the diversity of kids who come through the door,” Tatom said. “Athletes, popular, band, drama — they know it’s a safe place to go.”
Katie Kinnaird, an area director for Young Life, has also seen teens find it a safe place offering community and adult mentors who love them unconditionally. She oversees the groups in Henry County and also supervises those leading groups in Richmond, Rushville and now Greenfield.
“Middle school and high school years are a really vulnerable time,” she said. “Young Life provides a lot of support.”
In addition to the Young Life club nights, there are weekly Bible studies for students who want to grow deeper in their faith.
Jaclyn McQueeney, who went to Greenfield-Central High School with Tatom, is among those who’ve agreed to help with the group. She remembers a college hallmate who told of how influential the group was for her.
“I thought how needed this was in Greenfield,” she said, “for kids who don’t go to church or aren’t connected to any kind of church. Show them what it’s like to walk with Christ …
“It’s more of walking alongside them.”
Phil Strahm, associate pastor of Trinity Park United Methodist Church, remembers Tatom’s youth group days. Over the years since they would meet for breakfast when Tatom was in town and “talk about his heart for how God was going to use him,” Strahm said.
He said Tatom’s passionate about connecting with youth in the place where he grew up and having “a place where everyone can feel safe and be around positive adult influences who care about them — people who aren’t familiar with who Jesus is or been around people who have been changed as Chris has.”
Tatom said Strahm and other leaders at area churches and organizations have been supportive of Young Life, seeing it as a complement and not competition to the work they’re doing. He said in most communities the churches are reaching 10% to 20% of the student body, and Young Life often draws students from that other 80%, “the kids who won’t step into a church, necessarily,” he said.
He remembers what Young Life meant to the high school youths in the group he volunteered with in college, and “I want the kids here in this community to experience that too.”
