WE WERE DEEP in the thick heat of a Virginia summer when my teenage campers gathered to argue one night on the volleyball court.
It was 2011 and I was a counselor at Camp Hanover, a Presbyterian summer camp and retreat center. It was my third summer working at the outdoorsy camp, and prior experience with campers told me this group was at a breaking point. The issue that divided them? Whether it was okay to be queer and Christian.
I had seen this group go through the first of the classic team formation norms (“forming, storming, norming, and performing” developed by psychologist Bruce W. Tuckman). I knew they were itching to storm. Sure enough, as we sat on the cooling sand of the court, stars piercing through the cloud layers above and the volleyball net swaying in the breeze, they finally opened up.
Some had pastors in their home churches who preached against queer affirmation. Some were queer themselves, grappling with their self-understanding in the context of their teenage faith. All of them were questioning what they had been told by adult leaders and were digging through their collective wisdom for answers.
That moment is the perfect illustration of why religious summer camps are important: They provide places for personal and spiritual growth beyond what kids can access in their regular home and church environments. Camp provides space — external and internal.
Many camps offer kids and teenagers opportunities to gain new skills that complement their schooling and home life — moments that can build confidence, foster independence, and encourage self-discovery. As a teenager, I attended a secular camp that offered classes on wide-ranging liberal arts and STEM topics, and I cherish the memories from my time there.
But religious camps have an added layer that makes them distinct from other types of summer camp experiences, and important in their own right — they address some of the biggest questions kids will face on their lifelong journeys of faith and provide the adults guiding them with the chance to explore their own evolving values in ways that we want all of them to carry forward. They do so by creating a safe container in which kids can test their questions, beliefs, and relationship with God while being held in community by adults who are invested in the growth of their whole selves, including their spirituality.
As a counselor at a Christian summer camp, I guided my campers through creative worship that was unlike anything I had been exposed to. These were highly participatory experiences that encouraged kids to help craft liturgy and serve each other by leading elements of daily vespers and devotions. Candles in the shape of a cross filled the sand of the aforementioned volleyball court. Camp directors and staff chaplains wove modern song snippets into biblical and folk stories told around campfires. A fire floated on the surface of the lake as campers sat on a nearby dock. An outdoor chapel filled with simple wooden benches leading up to a plain wooden cross let nature do the rest of the liturgical heavy lifting, weaving the peace of God’s creation into every worship service through birdsong, the wind over the lake, and trees rustling.
These spaces for worship, coupled with moments for groups to engage in deep conversation and Bible study, were intentionally crafted and spontaneous, arising through the flow of a week in the life of the Christian community that camp built. For the campers, the staff, and even visitors, these experiences offered a way to connect to faith authentically outside of a familiar religious structure that often becomes rote and loses meaning. “A place apart,” as Camp Hanover calls itself, can bring you outside of your comfort zone in a constructive way, teaching you to form community, care for God’s creation, and experience a spirituality that shows how God is truly all around us. Faith-based summer camps provide an experience you cannot get anywhere else, shaping the worldview of youth at pivotal moments in their lives.
Of course, not all religious camps are created equal. There are places that teach harmful theology, pressure kids to conform instead of accepting and loving them for who they are, and offer a thin, substandard Christian education and foundation. Camps can be expensive, meaning the valuable experiences they offer might not be available to kids coming from lower socioeconomic levels. Not every camp will be right for every camper — a child who thrives in the theater or the dance studio might not find inspiration while paddling a canoe on a lake. And some camps have harbored instances of abuse between staff and campers. It’s worth doing careful research, looking for camps that come recommended through both trusted networks and external sources like the American Camp Association, and equipping your child to handle situations they may face.
But when they get it right, summer camps can become second homes that challenge kids to dive deeper. Beyond the campers (who are the focus of the programming), camps also provide a formative training ground for future pastors, teachers, and parents. Throughout the gospels, Jesus models the need to seek refuge from the intense pace of his life and ministry. He takes time away to rest and pray. He encouraged his disciples to do the same (Mark 6:31-32). Christian summer camps give campers and staff alike the same opportunity for respite while instilling key values like relationship-building, leadership development, and community formation, often with transformative results.
As kids go through the process of becoming distinct individuals beyond their families, Christian summer camps can help them address big, age-appropriate questions: Who is God, really? Did God actually form the earth and everything in it in six days? How does forgiveness relate to a sense of belonging? Camps have the chance to make (or break) kids at these key moments while their faith journeys and their relationship to the broader church are crystallizing.
That night under the stars on the volleyball court, my campers didn’t come to any conclusions. There were no firm theological answers. But since then, I’ve watched many of them grow up to become thoughtful adults who have intentionally crafted their paths in life, including their own beautiful expressions of faith. I like to think their experience at camp was a manifestation of God’s word as a headlamp pointed ahead of their feet and a light shining along their trails (see Psalm 119:105), shaping the paths of their lives and their faith in indelible ways.
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