Reading what you want, it sounds like you want the young guys to make a commitment to something.
I struggled with that a lot, and it focused a lot on what sort of career I wanted.
But, something I made my mind up about when I was a teenager was to choose to do things that were morally correct, rather than anything else. (I think I was struggling with using foul language, for starters.)
It’s not like I had a lot of options in front of me, but I still struggled and decided to do things that were morally correct. This sort of matter seems to be fundamental – making a commitment to one’s faith.
Ralph Martin of Ann Arbor Michigan has that program on EWTN called “The Choices we Face”.
Morally, we’re constantly confronted with choices, and deciding to do the morally correct thing requires courage, but it develops courage as well.
In high school, there was a priest in our daily religion class, that allowed us to have a discussion / debate about the post-world war II Nuremburg trials. That dunked us in a complex discussion that required some thought.
In college, I walked into a speech class one day, and we were confronted with making a one-minute speech about whether we thought it was best to support a coalition government in South Viet Nam. I barely understood the issue.
In both cases, my ignorance of the issue was a big factor, but I went into both of those trying to do the right thing.
You’re taking on a great big issue, trying to nail down the process of making a commitment in just some sort of presentation. Even if you find this book you’re looking for, you might try to get the young men interested by asking them what sort of choices they will be soon facing.
They might be willing to make a commitment, when they have more facts about whatever issue it is they’re facing. You may want them to think about what resources (and not just peer pressure) to make a decision.
There’s no shortage of critical issues they face: high school sex, high school drugs, high school gangs, etc. as the case may be. Then, there’s the common milestones like should they finish high school, does high school mean anything?, does their family mean anything to them?, etc. should they go to college? what career should they pursue?
Watching young people of my own age competing in the olympics shocked me to think about how I was wasting my own life.
You’ve got a big topic. Lots of luck.
