Passion of the Western Mind

Alright, well today I started reading the book "Passion of the Western Mind". This isn't necessarily a fun book, but was recommended by a friend to take a deeper look into what brought us to the worldview that we seem to have today. Just in the couple of pages I read, it seems to be very intellectual and therefore, very challenging. I'm guessing I will read only 2-3 pages a day if I'm lucky.

Today was mostly about Plato and Socrates and their thoughts on the Idea as something that is bigger than the concrete world. For example, in order for us to determine is something good, there has to be a collective Idea of what is good. In order for us to make comparisons as to whether or not something is better, there has to be an ideal that gives us a basis for comparison. These collective ideals are bigger than one person and bigger than the what we can 'get' from our senses, yet it has a piece of it that can be represented concretely in our world, and a piece that can be represented within our own mind. Another example used was that of a Horse. There is an Idea called horse. The idea Horse exists outside of space and time, yet it is manifested in time and space as individual creatures that we call horse. Even though there are differences within each of these creatures, they still conform to the idea Horse. An individual horse may be born, live and die, but the Idea Horse still exists. Additionally, we each have a perception of what an ideal horse would be in our own minds based on the Idea, but my perception of what makes a horse might be different from yours.

What does this have to do with youth ministry? I'm not sure yet. But there is a sense in my mind that some of this is what we are struggling with these days, and why the discussion is so important. That is to say we each have a perception of what a relationship with God entails. Somewhere there is an Idea of what all this is about, but we as humans may only see a small piece of that manifested both in our minds and concretely in the world around us. I wonder if the same can be said for youth ministry. That there is an Idea of what the right way to do ministry is, but each of us have a small piece of that manifested in our minds, as well as manifested concretely in the world around us.

All very philosophical of course, of which I'm not a philosopher, just trying to get down some of the stuff I'm reading and wrestling with. What do you think?