LONDON, ON—A new Canadian, interdenominational, conference-based ministry designed to support the growth and development of young girls, will hold its first conference February 4-5 in London, Ontario.

The founding director of the ministry says her organization, Girls’ Heart Point, plans to reach out and minister to girls in Grades 7 through 12, to challenge and inspire them to “an authentic faith” in Christ.

“I’ve been increasingly concerned about young women coming of age in a very dangerous, hyper-sexualized, media-saturated environment,” says Onalee Mitchell when asked why she founded the ministry. “They’re being set adrift to find their own truth and reality and identity with no definition of what is right and what is wrong.

“Girls are left to embrace everything that’s out there,” she adds. “There are enormous, life-threatening issues that have crashed in upon young women. And I think the problems are escalating in seriousness.”

Mitchell—who was a regional representative for Precept Ministries for two decades prior to launching Girls’ Heart Point—says countless girls today are being pressured to “leap frog from dirty knees to dirty dressing,” and that when they find they can’t live up to the “air-brushed” standards set by today’s media, they despair.

“It can easily lead them to depression and eating disorders. Some girls are cutting themselves.

Some become sullen and uncommunicative at home,” says Mitchell. “I sense that mothers are terribly worried about their girls in this culture, and some of them feel very helpless.”

Mitchell says the conferences Girls’ Heart Point will sponsor will be upbeat, high energy mother/daughter events which will address such issues as friendships, family relationships, fashion and beauty, sex and dating, self-esteem and a girl’s relationship with God.

The first conference, with room for 660, will be held at a London area high school and will feature contemporary Christian bands, artists and speakers, including Susie Shellenberger from Brio magazine.

Screen-writer and actress Jana Lyn Rutledge is scheduled to perform a short dramatic presentation. Rutledge says there is a powerful dynamic that can occur in such large group settings that God can use to spark change. “If something can touch [these young girls] and reach into their lives, to open them to God and to the plan that He has for them, and can give them some strengths to resist all of the forces that are trying to demoralize them, then I want to be a part of that,” says Rutledge.

Tim Roddick, youth pastor at London’s Stoney Creek Baptist Church, agrees. He has been calling on other youth pastors in his area to support the ministry, saying Girls’ Heart Point is a “great tool” for youth pastors and churches to have at their disposal.

“The conference will be valuable for equipping our girls to face the pressures that they get from school, their peers and the media today,” he says. “And those pressures are really the world’s view rather than God’s perspective. The people at Girls’ Heart Point have worked hard to bring positive role models together to offer the girls a Christian outlook on some of these issues.”

The ministry also runs a vibrant, girl-oriented website (www.girlsheartpoint.ca) that includes e-mail links for girls to request advice and prayer.

Mitchell says that while they are launching Girls’ Heart Point in southern Ontario, “if the opportunity should arise,” they will expand the ministry across Canada.