Sunday Morning Religious Education Program for Children and Youth
Nursery — Infant through 3rd birthday
Loving Care for All
Our care provider team, led by Nancy-Lee Mauger, creates a warm, welcoming environment for very young children.
Preschool (ages 3 and up) – Kindergarten
Celebrating Me and My World
Young children explore everything amazing about themselves, their families, their church, and the natural world through Celebrating Me and My World. Fall classes focus on their senses, their bodies, and all the wonderful things they can do. Look forward to spellbinding stories, active games, colorful art projects, and energetic dance and movement.
Grades 1 – 2-3
Love Will Guide Us
Children look to the constellations in the night sky as they explore the metaphor of being guided by the stars using the curriculum Love Will Guide Us. Each session will explore the many sources of our faith: the sense of wonder; the women and men of long ago and today whose lives remind us to be kind and fair; the ethical and spiritual wisdom of the world’s religions; Jewish and Christian teachings that tell us to love all others as we love ourselves; the use of reason and the discoveries of science; the harmony of nature and the sacred circle of life; and examples of faithful belief and action from our Unitarian and Universalist heritage. We will experience these sources of faith through storytelling, costume-box theater, active games, cool interstellar art projects, etc.
In addition, our first, second, and third graders will have the opportunity to reach across the ocean to make friends with children in Uganda. This year marks the beginning of our friendship with the first graders at the New Life School.
Grade 4 — Grade 5
Love Connects Us
Older children continue their exploration of “covenant” – of their connections and responsibility to each other, the church, the larger community, and the world – using the curriculum Love Connects Us. Expect more activities involving yarn, rope, embroidery floss, and other materials that can be tied, looped, knotted, and otherwise connected as we play games, make things, and worship together.
Junior Youth — Grades 6, 7 and 8
Coming of Age in Neighboring Faiths
During the fall, middle-school youth will explore the rituals and meaning of Coming of Age in Judaism, Catholicism, and Unitarian Universalism. Guests from these traditions will lead discussions and answer questions.
In Our Hands/A Social Justice Toolbox
During winter and spring, middle-school youth will share ideas about utopias and their hopes for the world. They’ll explore different ways that people have responded to injustice. Then they’ll engage in creative problem-solving together as they develop, implement, and evaluate their own social justice project.
Additional Program
Coming of Age
Coming of Age celebrates the spiritual transition from childhood to adulthood for youth who choose to engage in this year of discernment. We ask our youth, after years of religious education classes, to consider what they have learned and to develop a statement of their religious beliefs at this point in their lives.
This year our church will be offering a year-long Coming of Age program for our 8th and 9th graders. Youth are paired with mentors, with whom they meet monthly, to discuss their thoughts about a number of themes central to Unitarian Universalism. Youth also meet monthly with the minister and youth coordinator to further explore these themes.
This program begins in September and continues through April. A celebration service will be held in May.
