I’ve been privileged to get to know Kara Powell over the past year. She’s a Fuller Seminary professor, much published author, and the director of Fuller’s Center for Youth and Family Ministries. We met initially last April as part of UYWI’s Reload Curriculum team, and subsequently collaborated on the Justice for All project with World Vision, Fuller, and UYWI, and as a contributing author to her Deep Justice in a Broken World book (YS/Zondervan 2007). (Pre-order your copy today!)

At CYFM, Kara and her team translate youth ministry “research to resources” and consistently distribute great materials online, for free. A current report, for example, explores “Stress in the City: A New Study of Youth Workers.”

In either case, one leader likened urban workers to “sponges” who “absorb all this trauma and then are supposed to squeeze out wisdom. When all the pain comes into you, it’s easy to feel anger, stress, and pity. That pain has to come out somehow, or it can do real damage.” As this comment reminds us, experiencing trauma does not happen only when you are the victim yourself. We experience the pain of trauma when we hear stories, witness violence, or feel loss when a kid turns away from us and to drugs or gangs instead.

Reliable sources indicate that an upcoming CYFM feature story will report the findings of the Justice for All Project.