GIG:
Growing in Grace is a cooperative ministry between Christ Episcopal and Celebration. Dinner is served at 6:00pm, with classes at 6:30, and a closing worship at 7:40.
Schedule
What is Godly Play? According to Jerome Berryman, who developed this Montessori religious education: “Godly Play assumes that children have some experience of the mystery of the presence of God in their lives, but that they lack the language, permission and understanding to express and enjoy that in our culture. In Godly Play, we enter into parables, silence, sacred stories and liturgical action in order to discover God, ourselves, one another and the world around us.”
What makes Godly Play distinctive? In Godly Play, we tell Bible stories to children to encourage them to enter into the stories and relate them to their personal experience. Godly Play is concerned with the spiritual development of each child as an individual and with modeling the appropriate moral behaviors expected of people living within a Christian community.
Will my child enjoy Godly Play? One of the goals of Godly Play is to create a safe space for children – a place where their ideas, opinions, and gifts are deeply respected. Because everything is designed for children to use and enjoy, most children look forward to the time at “Sunday School,” or in our case, “GIG,” the Growing in Grace Ministry that meets on Thursday night.
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How will I know if my child is learning anything? The most important thing we teach in a worship-education center is how Christian people live and work together in community. Many parents who have children in the Godly Play program find that their children will begin to retell Bible stories – often in the car on the way home from church. Parents also report that their children “wonder” aloud at various times during the week about the meaning of the Bible stories they heard on Sunday.
Is Godly Play all you need to have a successful program for children and families? No. Godly play is, nevertheless, the heart of an integrated children’s ministry that includes children’s choirs, pageants, picnics, worship with the whole parish community, opportunities for service, etc.
Godly play is an effort to focus clearly and deeply on the child’s spirituality. This involves, enhances, supports, and enlarges the quality of relationships in the other activities for the children and their families, where you will apply what you learned here.
Is Godly Play “religious education”? This approach is really broader and different than what is traditionally thought of as “education”. It is not about classrooms with desks, blackboards, maps, and a teacher walking about and talking as children sit still and listen. Godly Play is an open access approach that works to give children the tools to identify, name, and value their religious experience. Perhaps, Godly Play should be understood as spiritual direction, but whatever you call it, the result is great and deep fun.
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