Click the link below for a PDF of the prayer activity, plus another fun Halloween Prayer.
Enjoy!
https://docs.google.com/open?id=0B2Jb2-8xEDPGTDIyUFFUam9TQXc
Thursday, October 25, 2012
Halloween Prayers
Kids and adults will all enjoy creating their own prayer using a Fun Size pack of M&Ms candies. Peanut alergy or non-chocolate eater? Re-work the colors and use Skittles!
Click the link below for a PDF of the prayer activity, plus another fun Halloween Prayer.
Enjoy!
https://docs.google.com/open?id=0B2Jb2-8xEDPGTDIyUFFUam9TQXc
Click the link below for a PDF of the prayer activity, plus another fun Halloween Prayer.
Enjoy!
https://docs.google.com/open?id=0B2Jb2-8xEDPGTDIyUFFUam9TQXc
Wednesday, October 24, 2012
Cleaning House with Reconciliation
Generally, I blog about children's formation. But this one is for the grown ups...
Last night we had our Parent Meeting for First Reconciliation Preparation. I always enjoy this opportunity to talk with adults about this often misunderstood and under-appreciated Sacrament. We start by asking parents to recall their own childhood experience(s) with Reconciliation - What did it look like? Who was there? And most importantly - How did it make you feel? Unfortunately, the answers to that last question are almost always negative, and last night was no exception. Parents remember feeling scared, embarrassed, intimidated, and ashamed. My goal is to help parents see the Sacrament in a new way, so that they can prepare their child for a positive, uplifting experience.
After a very brief look at the history of the Sacrament, we delve into the question: what is sin? Sin is anything that causes a break or strain in our relationship with God. Sin often also causes a similar break in our relationships to others. And, because we are all members of the Body of Christ, our personal brokenness weakens our faith community. Sin is both personal and communal.
Not all sins are created equal. Certain sins create a much larger and more severe break in our relationship with God and our community. Things like murder, theft, and adultery are considered "mortal" - or serious - sins when the sinner both understands the seriousness of the sin and freely chooses to commit it. These sins require the Sacrament of Reconciliation to help us heal that wound. It would be quite unusual for a second grader to commit a mortal sin. So for many, this begs the questions: Why do we "make" kids celebrate this Sacrament? And the follow-up question: Why should I, as an adult who has not committed mortal sin, "have" to go to confession? The best way I've come up with to answer those questions is the analogy of cleaning your house...
Think of your soul, and your relationship with God, as your house. Every day, you do little things to clean up around the house - loading the dishwasher, wiping the counter, tossing your clothes in the hamper. Similarly, every day we are called to pray - to spend time with God contemplating our actions, asking forgiveness when we fall short of living as Jesus would, and asking God to help us do better. This is our daily "straightening up" of our relationship with God.
Once a week, you probably do things like vacuuming the carpets and dusting. This more focused cleaning effort helps keep your house manageable throughout the week. This is like attending Mass, with the Penitential Rites and many prayers of forgiveness. The prayers of the Mass are sufficient for the forgiveness of most sins and prepare us to receive Christ in the Eucharist, which sustains our faith life throughout the week.
Then, once or twice a year, you do a good, thorough cleaning. Perhaps you get your carpets shampooed, clean the baseboards, or move the fridge to clean behind it. I love the feeling of peace I get when the house is really clean. This is like the Sacrament of Reconciliation! It's a deep cleaning for our souls, a chance to really reflect on bad habits we've too easily fallen into and start afresh with a clean slate. Ideally, it brings us a sense of peace, comfort, and renewed energy to live our faith.
But what about mortal sin? Or a sin that may not officially be categorized as mortal, but for whatever reason is eating away at you and making it hard to feel authentic in your relationship with God? The example I use for these situations always gets a few giggles, but it's a pretty effective visual: sometimes my dog poops on the floor. I don't leave it there until spring cleaning time; I deal with it immediately. Those sins that are eating at us are like the poop on the floor - we must deal with them right away. This is why we may sometimes feel the need for the Sacrament of Reconciliation more than once or twice per year, and this is why the Church teaches it is necessary in the case of mortal sin.
When we celebrate First Reconciliation at Risen Savior, we actually celebrate; our service is followed by a reception with treats and colorful balloons. If I've done my job, this makes perfect sense to the children, because they recognize the peace and joy that this Sacrament brings. If I've done my job really well, it makes sense to the parents, too. And ultimately, with the help of the Spirit, I hope that our families will be inspired to join the celebration again and again!
Last night we had our Parent Meeting for First Reconciliation Preparation. I always enjoy this opportunity to talk with adults about this often misunderstood and under-appreciated Sacrament. We start by asking parents to recall their own childhood experience(s) with Reconciliation - What did it look like? Who was there? And most importantly - How did it make you feel? Unfortunately, the answers to that last question are almost always negative, and last night was no exception. Parents remember feeling scared, embarrassed, intimidated, and ashamed. My goal is to help parents see the Sacrament in a new way, so that they can prepare their child for a positive, uplifting experience.
After a very brief look at the history of the Sacrament, we delve into the question: what is sin? Sin is anything that causes a break or strain in our relationship with God. Sin often also causes a similar break in our relationships to others. And, because we are all members of the Body of Christ, our personal brokenness weakens our faith community. Sin is both personal and communal.
Not all sins are created equal. Certain sins create a much larger and more severe break in our relationship with God and our community. Things like murder, theft, and adultery are considered "mortal" - or serious - sins when the sinner both understands the seriousness of the sin and freely chooses to commit it. These sins require the Sacrament of Reconciliation to help us heal that wound. It would be quite unusual for a second grader to commit a mortal sin. So for many, this begs the questions: Why do we "make" kids celebrate this Sacrament? And the follow-up question: Why should I, as an adult who has not committed mortal sin, "have" to go to confession? The best way I've come up with to answer those questions is the analogy of cleaning your house...
Think of your soul, and your relationship with God, as your house. Every day, you do little things to clean up around the house - loading the dishwasher, wiping the counter, tossing your clothes in the hamper. Similarly, every day we are called to pray - to spend time with God contemplating our actions, asking forgiveness when we fall short of living as Jesus would, and asking God to help us do better. This is our daily "straightening up" of our relationship with God.
Once a week, you probably do things like vacuuming the carpets and dusting. This more focused cleaning effort helps keep your house manageable throughout the week. This is like attending Mass, with the Penitential Rites and many prayers of forgiveness. The prayers of the Mass are sufficient for the forgiveness of most sins and prepare us to receive Christ in the Eucharist, which sustains our faith life throughout the week.
Then, once or twice a year, you do a good, thorough cleaning. Perhaps you get your carpets shampooed, clean the baseboards, or move the fridge to clean behind it. I love the feeling of peace I get when the house is really clean. This is like the Sacrament of Reconciliation! It's a deep cleaning for our souls, a chance to really reflect on bad habits we've too easily fallen into and start afresh with a clean slate. Ideally, it brings us a sense of peace, comfort, and renewed energy to live our faith.
But what about mortal sin? Or a sin that may not officially be categorized as mortal, but for whatever reason is eating away at you and making it hard to feel authentic in your relationship with God? The example I use for these situations always gets a few giggles, but it's a pretty effective visual: sometimes my dog poops on the floor. I don't leave it there until spring cleaning time; I deal with it immediately. Those sins that are eating at us are like the poop on the floor - we must deal with them right away. This is why we may sometimes feel the need for the Sacrament of Reconciliation more than once or twice per year, and this is why the Church teaches it is necessary in the case of mortal sin.
When we celebrate First Reconciliation at Risen Savior, we actually celebrate; our service is followed by a reception with treats and colorful balloons. If I've done my job, this makes perfect sense to the children, because they recognize the peace and joy that this Sacrament brings. If I've done my job really well, it makes sense to the parents, too. And ultimately, with the help of the Spirit, I hope that our families will be inspired to join the celebration again and again!
Thursday, October 4, 2012
Away We Go!
This month at GIFT, we kick off our "Faith Journey" theme. The symbols to introduce our monthly topics will come out of a fabulous old, avocado green, hard-sided suitcase. This month's session is titled, "Getting on Board," and the object in the suitcase is a boarding pass. Remember those? I know it's a dated symbol, but I liked it too much to let it go. The main themes of this session are having a positive attitude about growing in our faith and getting to know the people who are there to help us on the journey. We also dip our toes into the faith journey field guide - the Bible.
Opening Activity/ Discussion Starter
As kids and parents arrive, they pick up the Getting on Board worksheet to complete at their tables. It's a pretty simple, straight-forward matching game about who does what when you fly on a plane. Then, after revealing the boarding pass as our symbol for this session, I hand out bookmarks that look like this:
When you place the bookmark on the worksheet and line up the pictures, you can see how on our faith journey, our parents are like our pilots, coaches and teachers our copilots, etc. When I'm talking through this with the kids, I point out that even though our teachers and coaches may not be talking to us about God, they are teaching us Christian values like hard work, cooperation, and respect. I also stress that the kids are like the passengers - their main job is to listen to the people who are there to help them, especially their parents.
Opening Activity/ Discussion Starter
Crafts & Paper Airplane Activity
We have a lot of activities for this session! The kids make their own name tags, but I won't go into the details of that right now - if they hold up as well as I hope, I will dedicate a post to how to make them. Because this is our first session, we also get started on the "progressive craft" that we will add to at each future session. This year I have made it easy on myself by purchasing a kit from Oriental Trading Company. Their travel-theme VBS products from this past summer offered me some great options. We are making the Awesome Adventures Foam Cross. We will add a different foam sticker to it each month.
But my favorite activity for this session is the paper airplane game. First, kids make a paper airplane. Then, they fly the plane at a "game board" which is just a large piece of foam core board divided into 4 numbered sections. Whichever number the biggest part of the plane lands on, they take that numbered activity card from the table. The card then directs parents and kids to look up something in the Bible, discuss a few questions, and do a quick activity. The kids like it for the airplanes; I like it for the parent/child time spent together discussing Scripture. How often doe that happen? (Note: we use the "Breakthrough Bible" by St. Mary's Press; some content is only found in this Bible)
Closing Prayer/ Commitment
For our closing prayer, each child is given a boarding pass like the one I pulled from the suitcase. With a closer look, the kids can see that the coding at the bottom spells out "Got 2B Open." We talk about approaching GIFT and Mass with an open heart and mind. The kids write their names on their boarding passes as a sign of their commitment to do just that, and then the parents whisper a little blessing over them for the year. They turn in their passes, which will be hung in the Church commons, so that our parishioners can pray for them, as well.
So that's our start to the year...and we're off!
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