An Interview with some of the FBC Youth
You can read the interview included in our May 2018 newsletter.
Interview of Celine Uwera, Ben Sentis and Louise Kumungu by Esther Wiens
Esther: Tell me something about yourself, your age, favourite subject at school and perhaps why you like it.
Ben: I’m fourteen. I am homeschooled, which means that I get my work done faster and get free time. My favourite subject might be math.
Louise: I’m 15 in grade ten at O’Neil High School. My favourite subject is Catholic Studies.
Celine: I’m 17 in grade 11 and I go to Luther College High School. My favourite subject is French.
E: What do you do for fun when you have spare time?
L: I like to hang with friends or go to a movie. Or we go to watch games at places like the U. of R.
B: I do some Lego. I play outside with my brothers, building treehouses and stuff like that, and playing soccer and hockey when there’s ice.
C: I sing sometimes or talk to friends, whether it’s in real life or on social media or calling them.
E. Do you have a favourite sports team?
L: I like the Cleveland basketball team. I don’t watch a lot of sports but if they’re playing, I watch.
E: I understand the youth group is doing well. What activities do you enjoy or find meaningful?
B: I like it when there’ s physical activity that lets you get some exercise and have fun with other athletic people.
L: Just youth meetings in general. Every Friday, if you don’t have anything planned, you have “Youth” to look forward to. Just coming to “Youth” and hanging with everybody is my favourite part. It doesn’t matter what we’re doing, just coming together.
C: I really like that we do different things like going bowling, go out to get air, and doing things outside. Sometimes we don’t get opportunities to do those things on our own time. It’s too expensive; here we can have fun for free.
E: First Baptist Church is known as a “place to belong.” Do you feel you belong: if so, why, and if not, why not? What could we do to make things better for you?
B: Yes, I do. Well, I know pretty much all of the kids and I’m good friends with every single person here who is my age or close. I also know quite a few of the older people and just feel comfortable talking to them. I think it would be kind of fun if we could do a slightly different kind of worship music occasionally, like a worship band. Although, I get to do that other places like at camp and lots of other places.
L: Yes, because I know my way around the church, where everything is. I know who most people are. I talk to a lot of people and everyone is polite. If I’m asked, what church do you belong to, I can just say, First Baptist. It just rolls off the tongue nicely.
C: Yea, this is the place that I feel like I belong. Sometimes I feel the relationships in this church should go beyond church. People should be able to visit each other, actually form relationships outside of church. It shouldn’t be like, “I love you at church but after church I’m going to forget about you.” There should be friendships outside of our church.
E: We are a Christian Church. This can refer to our building, but the word “church” has another meaning. Some churches don’t have a building: they may, for example, meet in a school. What does “church” mean in such a case?
L. I think the togetherness and our faith. Because even though you might not have a church, you still have your faith and you still have beliefs and your views. You don’t need a building; you just need a section of the Bible, bring people together and you talk about it and that’s church.
Celine: I’ve read the church is within you. You don’t need a church building. You yourself, you’re the church.
E: Yes, Christ calls us to be his body.
B: That’s a good question. I think, yes, we would still be a Church. The church we used to go to closed down, the pastor was tired and wasn’t getting paid quite well enough. Everyone felt that God was telling us to go different ways. We still get together and we still feel like a church family, still worship together. Even if we didn’t meet together, we could communicate with each other and support each other that way.
E: We preach the gospel at our church. What does the word “gospel” mean to you?
C: Preaching the gospel is spreading love, how God showed love to people. He died for us.
B: The gospel is the story of what Jesus did for us. And I think that is exactly what we do teach most of the time. Some of the sermons are very good at that, and others can get a little confusing if you aren’t a good thinker. But that is what we focus on.
L: The words of God, the things that he said or the things that are in the Bible. Preaching the words that Jesus said.
E. In referring to Jesus we sometimes say, “He is our “Saviour” and sometimes we say, “He is Lord.” What do these words mean?
Let’s start with “Saviour.”
L: I think you mean he’s the one that’s going to save us all, the sins of the world, indulgences. He died for our sins to save us.
B: Well it means someone who saves you, and he did save the world when he died, from sin, and death, and Satan, and all the other stuff.
E. What about “Lord?”
C: He is our guide, protector, and counselor.
L: I second that.
B: I think that means: do we treat Jesus as our Lord and do we do everything to glorify him and to help other people. Or, do we live selfishly for our own selves?
E: When you think about your future, you may have a dream about what you’d like to become. Or maybe you just think about a profession/job that seems “neat” to you. Do you feel comfortable telling us what that is? I realize that you may change your mind a dozen or more times by the time you are ready to decide.
C: I want to do something in the dentistry field. Not a dentist, but something like a dental hygienist.
B: I’d like to start as a police officer and work my way either into an anti hacker who is really sophisticated in computers. Or go into law.
And I feel being a police officer would be a good way to start going in either of those directions. I want to do something that requires a lot of thinking, that you can get good at, and pays really well, and that you can help other people.
L. I think I’d be good at law. Maybe a judge or something. Or, I could be a lawyer; it sounds really fun and interesting. If you’re a lawyer, you carry justice in your hands. And you have the power to get an innocent person out of dying their life away in prison. Not a cop though, because you could get shot. I read about Thurgood Marshall: he was the first African American to serve on the Supreme Court of the United States. He stopped the segregation of the U.S. schools.
E: Is there something you would like to say that I haven’t asked?
C: You have a pretty smile.
E: Thank you. And thanks to all three of you for your cooperation.
(Thanks also to Chris Senger for making the interviewing process possible.)