Are Millennials Selfish and Entitled?

The Internet lit up recently with outrage when a twenty-something woman complained about how hard it was to live in San Francisco, because her job didn’t pay her enough. The post, directed toward the woman’s employer, Yelp, caused many to point out that Millennials are, as a generation, lazy, self-obsessed, and entitled.

The controversy caught my attention because I tend to hear similar things within the church directed toward Millennial Christians. I don’t feel qualified to speak to the general group psychology of the entire generation of Millennials, but I have spent most of my time for the past decade or so around Millennial Christians, and I think the nasty caricatures of them are just not true.

Within the secular culture, the Chicago Tribune’s Rex Huppke has called for a halt to “Millennial bashing.” He rightly notes that every generation in recorded human history sees the next as spoiled, lazy, and selfish. I agree. And every generation in church history tends to see the next as carnal, unorthodox, unevangelistic, and uncommitted. But it’s just not so. Read More