Soncatchers mentoring program plans benefit concert
An organization that pairs boys with positive male role models is raising funds through a benefit concert featuring Phil Keaggy.
Joey Shaw, founder of Soncatchers Mentoring, said the Christian faithbased agency will present the acoustic and electric guitarist and vocalist for a Sept. 16 concert at Trinity International Baptist Church in Oklahoma City.
After working with his band Glass Harp, Keaggy made the transition to a solo career, resulting in seven Gospel Music Association Dove Awards and two Grammy Award nominations. In 2014, he was named “Greatest Christian Rock Guitarist of All Time” by Guitar Player magazine. His new album, “All At Once,” is expected to be released soon as one of his more than 50 albums.
Shaw, 63, said Soncatchers Mentoring holds several fundraisers each year, most notably a sporting clay shooting event.
He said the fifth annual clay shooting fundraiser was held this past spring, but he wanted to do something else to raise money for the nonprofit.
Filling a void
Shaw said he is passionate about Soncatchers because it is designed to help fill a void in the lives of youths whose fathers are absent or not in their lives on a regular basis.
The ministry is an activity-based mentoring program, and Shaw said he and other mentors regularly take youths on fatherson excursions such as sports events, movies, fishing and hiking.
Also, an important aspect of the ministry is teaching young boys the importance of community service, so mentors often participate in community service projects with the youths they mentor.
Shaw said he and his wife, Patti, have raised three sons.
He said he spent 27 years as a staff counselor at Edmond Family Counseling, eventually becoming the organization’s executive director. He said he determined that he would mentor boys when he left the agency to pursue other interests.
Shaw said over the course of his counseling career, he saw many mothers bringing in their sons for counseling. He said most of the moms requested a male counselor, thinking the youths needed an adult male figure to talk to.
“That weighed a lot on my mind,” he said.
Shaw said it was in the 1980s when he noticed that many, but not all, of these women were single moms. The number of single moms raising boys alone has increased over the years, and Soncatchers is trying to aid these families, Shaw said.
He said the ministry initially began when he and some friends began taking youths to Peppers Ranch, when it was primarily for boys. Peppers Ranch is now a foster care community.
Shaw said he combined his experience as a father and youth league baseball coach with his experience as a counselor to create the mentoring excursions and life skills activities for the ministry.
He said eight to 10 men are currently part of Soncatchers, and more volunteers would be welcome.
Shaw said there are examples of single mothers who have been successful in raising boys without a father in the home.
Still, statistics show that boys who have a father in the home have a sense of safety and security that youths with absent fathers don’t typically have.
Soncatchers, with its father-son type activities, aims to provide the father figures that some youths may lack.
Over the summer, the ministry worked with the Mission OKC ministry to start a Trail Life Scout-like troop with youths living in northwest Oklahoma City apartments, he said.