Communal Prayer

This year I've been making some changes in Communal Prayer in the True Vine Atrium. For the last several years, the children have been leading a fairly structured service of songs, prayers and readings at the end of each atrium. This has been fine but unremarkable.

Last summer when I was training for Level Three catechesis I realized that this type of formal prayer was intended to be used with the 9-12 year old children. Communal prayer for the 6-9 year olds is meant to be an expansion of the open and spontaneous prayer practiced with the youngest children. This was a huge surprise to me! But I was relieved to learn that I've been doing this "wrong" because I felt intuitively that we weren't meeting the children's needs with our prayer service, and that we could probably be doing much more by doing less.

Since we began meeting in September I have been experimenting with a more relaxed prayer time. Generally I have been picking a few songs to sing together and reading a psalm from a prayer card, or a piece of scripture that is meaningful. I've begun inviting a bit of spontaneous prayer from the children and it is going well. Up to this point, I've been leading (with a little help from the children), but now that we are becoming accustomed to this style of prayer I will be asking children to take the lead. I still feel unsure about what this prayer time will look like, but I believe we are on the road, and I will keep looking to the children to lead the way!

We've been incorporating children's artwork into our prayer time when possible.  Last Sunday we had two lovely prayer cards copied by the children that we read and prayed together. I took some photos and have included them in this post for you to enjoy.

Below you can see the prayer table from Sunday. Our flowers were brightly colored and very attractive to the children! Every flower was used and the table was brimming! It makes me happy just looking at it!

Practical Life in the Atrium

As we begin our year together, I like to share some information about practical life in the atrium, which is so valuable but also easily misunderstood. Take a look at this post, called Why Practical Life?  to learn a bit more about how shifting beans from one bowl to another is meaningful work, and how polishing silver can be great preparation for prayer!

Meanwhile here are some photos of the practical life works we put together for the three to six year olds in the Good Shepherd Atrium this month. We always begin the year with simple works for our three year olds, and increase the difficultly as they develop their skills. Keep an eye out for the color green which points to the liturgical season - Ordinary Time or "Growing Time." We include the color of the season in our practical life whenever we can.

Moving beans from one bowl to the other develops the pincer grip.

Water is transferred from one bowl to the other using a sponge.
We place water in the left bowl, and color it green for the season.

Spooning beans into a pitcher and pouring them back into the bowl.

Sorting fruit.

Threading a card. There is a green string in the little jar.

Clipping clothes pins around the lip of the bowl. These are
new clothes pins made of bamboo and are so nice to touch!

Pushing pipe cleaners into holes.
A second step will be to add beads to the pipe cleaners.

Grasping stones with the whole hand and
shifting them from one basket to the other.

Learning to sweep up a spill.

Shrove Tuesday and Prayer Beads

On Shrove Tuesday, we made prayer beads for Lent. Here are a few pictures of the children working. I had a problem with my camera but Jenn was prepared, and kind enough to capture some memories for us. Thank you, Jenn!

What we didn't snap were pictures of the wonderful adults who came over to make prayer beads after the children were finished. I love Christ Church!

In atrium on Sunday some of the children made prayer beads as a work. As we were leaving the True Vine Atrium, I took some pictures of them with their beads just for fun! Enjoy!

A Child's Prayer

Take a look at this beautiful prayer written by a seven year old in the True Vine Atrium. This was created spontaneously during work time in the atrium. It just takes my breath away...

"Oh God. Oh holy God thank you for life. 

Imagine what the world would be like without life."

Why Practical Life? Revisited!

Below is a re-post about practical life from over a year ago. (I've just celebrated my one year anniversary of blogging!). I though it might be helpful to our new families and to others who want to know more about practical life to post this information again. 

When we first began our atrium, I was skeptical about Montessori's Practical Life Exercises.  Don't get me wrong - I could see their value in a Montessori setting but I wasn't convinced that we needed them in the atrium.  We began with just a few basic activities, but I quickly discovered the spiritual dimensions of practical life, and now we can't get enough of it!  In fact, I first became interested in blogs as a way of hearing from some of the wonderful Montessorians on the web who write about their practical life exercises.  Setting up practical life, and changing it to meet the needs of the children as their skills develop over the year requires a good deal of observation and creativity, and I have come to enjoy it as much as the kids!

We have practical life activities in all of our atria, but by far the most can be found in the Good Shepherd Atrium (for 3-6 year olds).  Over the years, I have observed a strong connection between handwork and spirituality.  Pouring beans from one pitcher to another, moving water with an eye dropper, arranging flowers in a vase -- one only needs to observe a young child engaged in these activities to recognize the deep concentration, peacefulness and contentment that they can elicit.  Concentration, peace, and contentment are key attributes of prayer and meditation, and practical life builds up these attributes in the children better than anything else. As the child's capacity for concentration and joy in the presence of God grows, so does his or her ability to listen to presentations and mediate on the aspects of the Bible and the liturgy of the Church that we are offering in the atrium. 

In these first weeks, practical life will get quite a work out in our atria - and we catechists couldn't be happier!


For pictures of some of the practical life works featured on the blog this year, click here.

With Thanksgiving for Sofia

I just received the announcement below from The National Association of the Catechesis of the Good Shepherd saying that Sofia Cavalletti died this morning at the age of 94. I had the honor and pleasure of meeting Sofia in 2004 when visiting Rome. She was a woman of great strength and intellect, who loved God deeply and cared passionately about the spiritual lives of children. As we prepare for a new year of Christian Formation at Christ Church, we join with friends all over the world who give thanks to God for Sofia and the tremendous gift she has given us in the Catechesis of the Good Shepherd.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior.”

Luke 1:46-47

Dearest Friends,

With tears and with peace, we want to share with you that our beloved Sofia Cavalletti, at 94, a founding mother of the Catechesis of the Good Shepherd, has entered the celestial pasture of the Good Shepherd. There is great rejoicing in heaven for her with Gianna, Tilde, Fr. Mongillo, Maria Christleib and Tina, along with members of her family who have gone before her.

Francesca Cocchini sent the following announcement from Rome, Italy: “Dearest, this is only to say that during this night – at ten after midnight (Tuesday, August 23) Sofia encountered the Good Shepherd face to face.” The funeral mass will be on Wednesday, August 24.

Francesca also shared the announcement for the Italian newspaper, Repubblica:

“The Maria Montessori Association for the Religious Formation of the Child sings the Magnificat for the life of Sofia Cavalletti who gave the Catechesis of the Good Shepherd to the Church. Eucharist is at 11 am, Wednesday, 24 August, at S. Giovanni dei Florentini Church, Rome.”

Sofia goes ahead of a large family of Catechesis of the Good Shepherd catechists and children in thirty-seven countries around the world. A Hebrew and scripture scholar, Sofia began to work with children in 1954, collaborating with Gianna Gobbi, a Montessori educator. Together they were called and inspired by the children they served to listen, watch, and deepen an understanding of children’s spirituality in relationship with God.

Sofia leaves to the world an approach to the Christian formation of children from the ages of three to twelve that is theologically sound, systematic, and rich in Bible, liturgy, and sacred history. Sofia’s reverence for the Bible and liturgy, her fresh and compelling style of writing and speaking, her wise and intelligent way of discussing complicated theological themes simply, her sense of humor, and personal warmth will be greatly missed by many.

Please go to our Facebook page (The National Association of Catechesis of the Good Shepherd) to share your prayers and remembrances of Sofia and feel free to forward this email to other catechists & friends you know who may not yet be members of our association.

With great love and affection,

The Board and Staff of CGSUSA
---------------------------------------------
The National Association of the Catechesis of the Good Shepherd has posted a beautiful tribute to Sofia on their home page. You can see it by clicking here.

Meditation Garden Update

We've been away on vacation, but I am back and working on an atrium post which should be on the blog soon. In the meantime, I wanted to share how much I am enjoying our meditation garden this Lent. I've gotten into the practice of praying with my garden every day. 

In the morning, I empty the garden and arrange the sand (with curves or impressions, or by adding some pine cones or greenery to the garden). Then I place a candle in the sand and light it with a prayer remembering that Jesus is our light. 

I've been choosing a stone for each prayer concern or thanksgiving that I wish to focus on. I pray with the stone in my hand, then place it in the garden near the light. I've kept the candle lit all day when I am home working and in the evening, and whenever I want to pray I sit near it and chose another stone. It has been really wonderful to "see" my prayers gathered around the light throughout the day.

Our Atrium and Youth classes are meeting again this Sunday after taking a week off for Spring Break. We'll see you and your family at 9:15 am!

Lent at Home!

I have finally put together some things around my house for our family observance of Lent and thought I would share them with you here.

One thing I've done is put the shepherd and sheep from my Nativity Scene back on the mantle to remind us of the Good Shepherd. At Christmas this year, my Mom gave me the set that my Grandmother made for our family in the 1960's and I have really enjoyed having it. My reluctance to put it away gave me the idea to enjoy it as a reminder of the Good Shepherd. I sometimes light a candle next to the Good Shepherd it in the evening. Isn't it beautiful?

I also put together a meditation garden for my family this year. I made several of these a few years ago as Confirmation gifts for two young women who are special to me. I've seen nature tables and meditation gardens around on the web, but the idea really came together for me after our Church used the book and Leader's Guide for "My Faith, My Life", a wonderful Confirmation program by Jenifer Gamber. She has the confirmands work with a garden like this each week at their meetings. I utilized some of her ideas and added some of my own to make a set of cards with suggestions for praying with the meditation garden.

Here are some of the supplies I have pulled together for our family. You can see I have stones (for building paths and "altars," representing prayers concerns, etc.). I also have a bottle of water and of scented oil, and a few shells as symbols of baptism. The shells can be used to make impressions in the sand, can be arranged in the garden, or can hold water or oil. The candles remind us of Jesus - the light of the world. I found some little pieces of fence to make shapes and paths in the sand. There is a stick with some pine cones attached that I found on a walk. I also added some small wooden shapes with pieces of scripture written on them that I received at Vacation Bible School once.

The lenten prayer chain we made on Shrove Tuesday is hanging in the window in our kitchen. I am really enjoying this lenten discipline. My husband had the wonderful idea of tearing off the day's prayer focus in the morning so that we can pray with it throughout the day, and then pray together with it before dinner. Such a little thing but it has made a big difference!

Are you doing something for lent with your family this year? If not, it isn't too late! Check out the resources for lent listed here for more ideas. Pick something and go for it!

Try This! Lent

Today is Ash Wednesday, and the season of Lent has begun. On Sunday during Christian Formation classes the children decorated the letters of the word "Alleluia" --that word of joy and praise that we do not say in Lent. (I've gotten myself in a bit of a pickle by not telling you about this before Lent began - please bear with me!)  At the end of our 10:30 service, the children processed up the aisle with the decorated letters and lined up to form the "A" word.  Then we put all the letters into a box and tucked them away in the Sacristy for the season of Lent. On Easter morning, we will see the word again, both in our worship and in a beautiful banner hanging in the Church, made from the letters the children decorated on Sunday. We've done this for several years, and I always enjoy it. It is a concrete way for the children to understand the more prayerful and reflective tone of Lent. They take it seriously, and carefully avoid the "A" word at all cost! Be sure that you do too! (That was my last slip, I promise!)

Lent is a time to grow closer to God through prayer. Last night at our Shrove Tuesday Pancake Supper we made paper prayer chains with the children. I'll admit, this was not the most thrilling craft we've done at the Pancake Supper, but I'm really excited about it.  Cathy Wolford, a wonderful member of our parish, wrote out 35 ideas for prayer this Lent. She also provided five spaces to write your own prayers.  We cut up the slips of prayer suggestions and made them into chains. For every day in Lent (except for Sunday, which is a "little Easter") your family is invited to rip off a ring and pray for the intention listed.

As I said, I didn't have high hopes for this little project, but I've come away pretty excited about it. It is a very easy way to observe Lent on your own or with children, and I think it will help set a prayerful tone for this special season. If you are the parent of teenagers who are not all that interested in Lent (as I am!), this may be particularly helpful! In my family, we will be using the links to focus our prayers before dinner.    

If you didn't get your paper prayer chain at the Supper last night, we will have the supplies available at Church tonight for our Ash Wednesday services and on Sunday.  Take a packet home and make it up to share with your family this Lent. In my next post, I'll share some wonderful ideas for bringing Lent into your home from friends around the web!

Don't forget the 5:30 pm Ash Wednesday Service for Families today!  I hope to see you there!

Ash Wednesday Service for Families

Ash Wednesday Service for Families

Wednesday, March 9th

5:30 pm in the Chapel

Lent begins next week!  Ash Wednesday is the first day of a forty day period of preparation for the events of Holy Week and Easter.  For the past several years, Rev. Peter and I have been offering a 5:30 pm service specifically for families on Ash Wednesday.  The meaning of Ash Wednesday is a bit difficult to convey to young children. I have found that the penitential tone is not a natural fit for their spirituality.

Rev. Peter and I have collected some wonderful ideas from my fellow Christian Educators and some thoughts of our own to create an Ash Wednesday service which is streamlined and focused on the elements of this holy day which are most vibrant and essential to young children - the imposition of ashes and Holy Communion. I love this service, and look forward to it every year.

One aspect of the service that resonates with the children is the gesture the priest makes with the ashes. Beginning at age four in the atrium, we learn that at Baptism, the priest  makes a small cross with oil on the forehead of the person being baptized, and says "You are sealed by the Holy Spirit in Baptism and marked as Christ's own for ever."  On Ash Wednesday we see that cross again -- this time made with ashes and oil on all of our foreheads --  and we are reminded that we belong to Jesus. This year Rev. Peter and I are going to try burning palm branches at the beginning of the service with the children, so that they can see where the ashes come from and connect to this gesture even more deeply.

If you are a local reader, I hope you will join us in the Chapel at Christ Church for our 5:30 pm Ash Wednesday Service for Families! 

The Lord's Prayer, Part Two!

I received a great question on Facebook in response to my last post on The Lord's Prayer!   Toni wanted to know what work the children did when they were younger to prepare them for this one. I thought I would respond to her question on the blog for you to hear as well!

We have many works that are indirect preparation for understanding the Lord's Prayer. For example, starting at age 3 we spend a lot of time meditating on the kingdom parables.  What is the kingdom like? It's like a tiny mustard seed that grows and grows, and is a shelter for the birds.  It's like a precious pearl that the merchant sold everything to have, and so on. So when we look at "your kingdom come" the children already know a lot about the kingdom and they desire it! 

Also in the 3-6 year old atrium the children have come to know the Good Shepherd parable.  While working on the Lord's Prayer, I can ask "Does anything here remind you of the Good Shepherd?"  The children themselves are able to lift up the love and care of a Father as being like the Good Shepherd, and "daily bread" as being everything the sheep need to live, even the Good Shepherd himself given in the bread and wine. 

When we talk about sin and forgiveness in the Lord's Prayer, the children can remember their work at Level Two with the True Vine parable.  They understand that sin is something that blocks the sap which runs through the vine to the branches, and that forgiveness opens us up to God again. 

There are other amazing connections the children make, but you get the picture! Thanks for the great question Toni!

The Lord's Prayer

Today in the True Vine Atrium (for first, second, and third graders) we meditated upon the Lord's Prayer. We used a material that breaks the prayer down line by line, so that the children can manipulate it like a puzzle. Walking through the Lord's Prayer with the children reminded me once again that the works we do in the atrium draw children into the most essential dimensions of the Christian faith.  The children were able to connect with Jesus' prayer in a significant way because of all the works they have encountered before.  It is truly amazing!

Children spent some time in atrium decorating their own copy of the prayer to take home. If you have a first, second or third grader, take a moment to pray this prayer with him or her during the week! If your child was absent today, you can find the Lord's Prayer as we use it in Church in the Book of Common Prayer on pg. 364 or you can look it up in the Bible (Matthew 6:9-13 and Luke 11:1-4). Help your child to hang the prayer up, and encourage him or her to pray it silently if so moved. Try praying the Lord's Prayer together before you head out in the morning or last thing before your child goes to bed.  It is also a wonderful prayer to offer when you are worried about someone or something, as the children suggested in our conversation today. Enjoy the beauty of the Lord's Prayer yourself this week!

Why Practical Life?

When we first began our atrium, I was skeptical about Montessori's Practical Life Exercises.  Don't get me wrong - I could see their value in a Montessori setting but I wasn't convinced that we needed them in the atrium.  We began with just a few basic activities, but I quickly discovered the spiritual dimensions of practical life, and now we can't get enough of it!  In fact, I first became interested in blogs as a way of hearing from some of the wonderful Montessorians on the web who write about their practical life exercises.  Setting up practical life, and changing it to meet the needs of the children as their skills develop over the year requires a good deal of observation and creativity, and I have come to enjoy it as much as the kids!

We have practical life activities in all of our atria, but by far the most can be found in the Good Shepherd Atrium (for 3-6 year olds).  Over the years, I have observed a strong connection between handwork and spirituality.  Pouring beans from one pitcher to another, moving water with an eye dropper, arranging flowers in a vase -- one only needs to observe a young child engaged in these activities to recognize the deep concentration, peacefulness and contentment that they can elicit.  Concentration, peace, and contentment are key attributes of prayer and meditation, and practical life builds up these attributes in the children better than anything else. As the child's capacity for concentration and joy in the presence of God grows, so does his or her ability to listen to presentations and mediate on the aspects of the Bible and the liturgy of the Church that we are offering in the atrium.

In these first weeks, practical life will get quite a work out in our atria - and we catechists couldn't be happier!

Click here for another post on practical life with pictures of some of the work on our shelves!