Posted anonymously by a former Young Life member.
Young Life is not a cult. It doesn't have a central leader with very much control over the whole. I do think think that it can lead to cults among the individually run areas, though. Every area has an area director, and in the Young Life that I was in, that area director had a number of similarities to a cult leader. I also think you have to realize that you are dealing with high school students here. That lowers the standard in my opinion for what amount of deception and force are required to consider something a cult. From a Young Life flyer:
We meet young people where they hang out: the streets, school events, shopping malls and fast-food restaurants. We get to know their names, what they enjoy and dislike and what concerns and confuses them. We help kids deal with the stresses and temptations of adolescence, providing them with wholesome fun, positive adult role models and constructive choices. After we've become friends and win the right to be heard, we share with them the good news of Christ in language they understand.
Just as in any cult, Young Life consists of progressive stages of involvement, each one a bait and switch of sorts, where you are led to believe that you are getting into one thing, but are actually getting into something much deeper. They never use direct force, merely deception and threats (of hell), like any good con-artist. The stages are described by Young Life as Contact, Club, Camp, and Campaigners.
The whole indoctrination proceeds very much like that of the Unification Church, as described by Christopher Edwards in his book Crazy for God:
{The members} entered into the singing with tremendous enthusiasm, while most of the guests, like myself, sat silently and watched. There was something about the entertainment that seemed very carefully orchestrated, even the way the well-scrubbed audience was clapping riotously to the music. As I clapped politely to the singing, I looked around me.
The songs at "club" are very carefully orchestrated, and there is a specific song book which they are all to be chosen from, but many of them have no positive message other than to follow the leader. A good example would be Baby What You Want Me To Do, by Jimmy Reed, a favorite at the Young Life I went to:
You got me running, you got me hiding
You got me run, hide, hide, run
Anywhere you want me, let it roll, yeah, yeah, yeah
You got me doing what you want me
Baby what you want me to do
Heightened emotions, submissive lyrics, simultaneous clapping (anyone who clapped even somewhat off-beat was always admonished). If your purpose is to teach the truth, shouldn't the truth speak for itself? From http://www.ao.net/~oja/skits/
4. Background music always draws in kids more. Loud and rockin’ helps. Also, leaders, student leaders, and campaigner kids must scream and cheer for everything. One of the greatest things we can do for a kid is to get a bunch of their schoolmates cheering wildly for them. For most it would be a first and possibly a last at this experience. Get people to cheer!
Reading http://www.ao.net/~oja/campsign.htm made me sick to my stomach. "Sell camps year-round...Hard sell starts 5 months prior to summer". "Always ask 'If you were going, who would you like to have come along? Let's get in touch and see if we can't get them psyched and get a bunch of you going.' (Record new names on your list including phone #s and addresses.)" "Get the deposit as soon as possible. If possible, go to the house and pick it up." "Have a non-refundable deposit after a certain date." "Kids can't make a commitment while they're in a group. Lay some generalities on them (to psych) but don't press for a commitment from individuals. For commitment, talk to {k}ids individually (following steps G&H)"
For kids you don't know - "Hi, this is __________. I help out with Young Life in the area. The reason I'm calling is I was just talking with ________ about Windy Gap, a resort where we take kids each summer. _________ is real interested in going (or is going) and he told me to tell you about it. Have you heard anything about Windy Gap? It's a great place! Have you got a minute for me to tell you a little more about it?"
That's a bold-faced lie! The reason you're calling is that you were just talking with ___? You're planning that ahead of time? No, the reason you're calling is because you think the kids going to go to hell and you think if you can get him to camp then you can preach to him and "save" him. "he told me to tell you about it"? Not only an appeal to peer-pressure, but a lie! Honestly, I am sick to my stomach right now.
BUT, also, you will multiply by 2, 4, or as much as 10 times the number of kids who will go. AND, you will have the satisfaction of knowing that you have followed the Lord's commands as outlined in the beginning.
Like any other cult, using the Bible to encourage people to commit a sin (in this case, deception and false witness). Apparently one of the Lord's commands is "Thou shalt get kids to go to Windy Gap" now.
Many of the Young Life leaders I've talked are completely candid about the deception they practice. One of the principles of Young Life established by the founder James Rayburn is to "Capitalize on the elements of good humor and music to establish an openness of mind and heart." Another is to "Communicate your enthusiasms and certainties, rather than flaunt your doubts." What these leaders have told me is that they are fighting a battle against drug dealers who hook kids in by offering lighter drugs first, for free, and then gradually sucking them in in a similar bait and switch fashion (my words, not theirs). Why, they ask, shouldn't they fight back in the same way?
The answer to this question I'm not going to argue. I don't believe that it is ever a good thing to trick people into believing something, no matter how good you think that thing is. But the fact is, Young Life does not merely teach Christianity, or the Bible, or universally accepted positive values. They teach their own twisted interpretation of things.
A born-again Christian group, YL teaches kids that most of their parents, their friends, their teachers, most people in the world are wrong and are going to burn in hell. They teach things with absolutely no biblical basis, such as when one leader said during a club meeting that "Christ's spirit went to hell when he died" and that "When Christ was in hell he preached to demons." He went on to say that "Christ went where we should go" and that is why "we feel bad about ourselves." A Young Life area leader said this at a club meeting:
Jesus is the most misunderstood person who ever lived... By far our society is clueless, they have no idea who this man is. None, zero, they have this much {holding fingers up to indicate very little} information and I would bet it's wrong.
And that statement of seeming fact was accepted by most of those who were there. The flaw of Young Life is the deception, and the potential for harm is that the leader's interpretations of Christianity become accepted as the truth. The leader may be right, but if so, the truth should be allowed to speak for itself.