Young Life Armenia builds friendships with teenagers across the country, brings them to Pioneer Camp in the mountains, and stays alongside them while they work out who Jesus is.
It began with a handful of adults who made time for teenagers, and kept making it.
In 301 AD Armenia became the first country in the world to embrace Christianity as its national faith. After the Soviet decades of the 20th century, the country regained independence in 1991 and returned to its spiritual heritage.
Young Life Armenia works in that inheritance. Leaders spend months, sometimes years, with the same young people — at school, at club, on the way to camp — and in those friendships talk plainly about Jesus. Nobody is asked to agree with anything to be welcome.
“The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field.”
Matthew 9:37
Our mission is introducing adolescents to Jesus Christ and helping them grow in their faith.
25
A quarter of a century
25 Years in Armenia
Twenty-five years of clubs, camps and leaders in Armenia — and of campers who came back as the ones leading.
Archive footage and today's camp, twenty-five years side by side.
The camp
Pioneer Camp
A week in the mountains: sport, hiking, meals together, and an honest conversation about faith.
In the mountains, with friends
Pioneer Camp stands at Artavaz, on the Marmarik River, about ninety minutes from Yerevan. Groups come for a week at a time — dorms, shared meals, and a valley with very little else in it.
Days are for hiking, sport and games. Evenings are quieter: a short talk about who Jesus is, then time to sit with it, ask about it or argue with it.
Day routes into the mountains and down to the rivers.
Campfire
Evening conversations, songs and stories.
Sport and games
Football, volleyball and camp-wide tournaments.
Cabins and shared meals
Shared rooms, shared food, a shared day.
The last stretch uphill
Weather coming in across the gorge
Getting there is half of it
Catching breath between halves
Full time
The match, with the valley behind
Camp history
Then, transformation, today
Choose a stage and see how the camp has changed.
the Soviet years
A former Soviet camp
This place was once a gathering ground for Soviet youth, where Armenian teenagers were taught atheism and communism.
the refurbishment
The transformation
Young Life rebuilt the site as a Christian camp. It now serves close to the opposite of the purpose it was built for.
today
The camp today
Today it hosts groups from across Armenia through the summer and winter programmes. For a good number of them it is the first place the Christian faith is explained to them rather than argued at them.
Everyone starts the afternoon in a white shirt. Nobody finishes in one.
Powder paint by the bucket, shaving foam, a hosepipe and whatever the kitchen can spare. It runs for one afternoon and takes the rest of the evening to wash out.
It is an easy day for a newcomer. After twenty minutes everybody looks the same, and the quietest person on the field is in every photograph with the rest.
A white shirt nobody loves
Powder paint, by the bucket
Shaving foam
One hosepipe, running
A watermelon rind makes a good helmet
The bucket that starts it
Soaked, painted, still standing
Shaving foam, and no complaints
Green on one side, red on the other
Five of them, unrecognisable
Everyone, at the end of Colour Day
On the field
Relays & Team Games
Team games on the field, most days of the week.
The hoop must not drop — everything else is a detail
Every day brings a few contests on the field: a hoop relay, walking on wooden stilts, hand-offs, and games that simply do not work without a team.
Scores are forgotten by dinner. Teams are mixed on purpose, so campers spend the afternoon alongside people they did not arrive with.
Choose a part of the year below. Tap any photo to see it larger.
Filmed stories
Videos
A tour of the camp, the anniversary film, and days at Young Life Armenia.
Magazine
Stories
People, camps, ministry and news.
Pioneer Camp
The first week of summer
How the season opened: new friendships, the first hike and a fire that lasted into the night.
Leaders
Why leadership starts with listening
Volunteer leaders on what it means to show up without judging.
Young Life Armenia
From the archive: photos of the first camp
Frames found in old albums, and the people who still remember those days.
Camper stories
“I didn't want to come at first”
A story about how one week changed a whole year.
Ministry
How a club works in one town
Weekly meetings, small groups and the trust built over a year.
News
Getting the camp ready before the season
A volunteer week: paint, timber, the kitchen and a lot of coffee.
Full stories are published on Instagram while this section is being built.
In numbers
What these years have held
9,835kids known by name
3,938kids to camp
543kids to club weekly
309kids to campaigners
256volunteer leaders
Figures as of mission year-end, May 2025.
People
What supporters say
Once you get to know someone personally like this, you fall in love with them and develop an urge to give. They are getting the gift, but we feel it is a gift to us.
Jerry & Nelda BakerYoung Life Armenia staff sponsors
Together
How to get involved
Three ways to be part of it.
Support
Your gift pays for days at camp, the journey there, and the training of leaders.
You help a leader establish a club in the area, covering rent, equipment and programme supplies.
$150per camper
Send a kid to camp
Every kid wants to experience the best week of their life, but not every family can afford the trip.
$200+ $25 · 3 years
Plant a tree, grow a life
Your gift plants a tree at Pioneer Camp and sends one teenager to camp, and monthly support walks with them in faith and leadership for three years.
Amounts are shown in US dollars, as in Young Life’s own materials.
Ways that cost time, not money
1 hronce a month
Join our Action Team
Every second Tuesday, join a community of people who pray, hear ministry updates, and stand behind our leaders and students. Then take the story with you — invite a friend, speak at your church, host a coffee.
Experience the mission firsthand. Travel with your church, your family, friends, or on your own. Meet the young people, hear stories of transformed lives, and see how the ministry works from the inside.