1. Since the days of the youth movement, church youth work has often lacked that element of Christian sobriety that alone might enable it to recognize that the spirit of youth is not the Holy Spirit and that the future of he church is not youth itself but rather the Lord Jesus Christ alone. It is the task of youth not to reshape the church, but rather to listen to the word of God; it is the task of the church not to capture the youth, but to teach and proclaim the word of God.
2. Our question is not: What is youth and what rights does it have, but rather: What is the church-community and what is the place of youth within it?
3. The church-community includes those on earth whom God’s dominion has torn away from the dominion of death and evil, those who hear the word concerning the establishment of God’s dominion among human beings in Jesus Christ and who obediently assemble around this word in faith. The church-community is Christ’s presence as the true Lord and Brother. Being in the church-community means being in Christ; being in Christ means being in the church-community. Sacrifice, intercession, and confession are the acts of fellowship in the church-community. It is only within the church-community that one can pass judgment on the church-community. By nature the church-community cannot be judged from the outside.
4. The church-community suspends the generational problem. Youth enjoys no special privilege in the church-community. It is to serve the church-community by hearing, learning, and practicing the word. God’s spirit in the church has nothing to do with youthful criticism of the church, the radical nature of God’s claim on human beings nothing to do with youthful radicalism, and the commandment for sanctification nothing to do with youthful impulse to better the world. “Christian” [and] “youth’ is a rather harsh and not very credible word combination. The issue is not ‘modern” or “old fashioned,” but rather solely our thinking concerning and from the perspective of the church.
5. The Bible judges youth quite soberly: Gen. 8:21; Isa. 3:5; Jer. 1:6; Eccl. 11:10; 1 Pet. 5:5; 2 Tim. 2:2 et passim.
6. Church youth work is possible only on the basis of addressing young people concerning their baptism and with the exclusive goal of having them hear God’s word. It remains the act of the church-community toward its members. Every transgression of this boundary constitutes a betrayal of Christ’s church-community.
7. It may well be that the youth do have the right to protest against their elders. If that be the case, however, the authenticity of such protest will be demonstrated by youth’s willingness to maintain solidarity with the guilt of the church-community and to bear that burden in love, abiding in penitence before God’s word.
8. There is no real “church association”; there is only the church. The church youth association is not the youth of the church-community; that youth includes rather all baptized young people. Every church association as such already discredits the cause of the church. Such associations can only be perceived as makeshift entities, which as such have only relative significance.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer's "Theses on Youth Work in the Church":