Tag: COVID 19 ministry

Outdoor Sunday School-A Nursing Perspective

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I live in Austin, Texas, and attend Central Presbyterian Church in downtown Austin. I run the children’s program under the associate pastor as well as teach Godly Play. During the week I am a pediatric home health nurse. I work nights fifty hours a week for a patient who is severely immune compromised, the common flu or RSV sends my patient to the (P)ICU. When I went into isolation March 13th, 2020, I did not know it would be 15 months until I would see any of my church family again.  

We reopened June 13th, 2021, with masking HIGHLY encouraged for everyone and the first thing I did when I sat down in the pews again was look out the windows and see some of my kids. I got right back up and went outside to be with them, because that is where I have always been called to be in the church, with the children.  

I wanted to be there for the kids and return to some sense of ”normal,” so I began brainstorming how to best restart our Godly Play program. Over the lockdown I had been writing a small synopsis for our e-blast with YouTube links for videos of that week’s story. I didn’t do Godly Play live during quarantine because it felt like it was one more thing for parents to feel obligated to chaperone and I liked the idea of them being able to do it on their time. When we were able to come back together I wanted to do so in the safest way possible and that was never going to happen in doors.  

I was vaccinated, but the vaccine was not available (and still is not currently available, but might be, come October! *fingers crossed*) for children at that time. So the safest place for us to meet was outside. The only problem? It was summer in central Texas with temperatures consistently in the 90’s. That first Sunday back while talking to some of the parents on the playground I threw around the idea of restarting Godly Play outside. There is this space in our playground that used to have swings, but those were torn down a few years ago due to safety concerns (they were falling apart). The area was constantly in the shade between the fellowship hall and a neighboring parking garage. It was at least 5 degrees cooler there. I got an old quilt for us to sit on (that I washed every week) and encouraged everyone to bring their own water bottles (or provided individual ones). Our fellowship hall was right there if anyone needed a few minutes of AC and I decided not to provide snacks. When I was out of town I would let everyone know a week or two in advance and decided against having a substitute. I continued to send the YouTube videos via blast for those who were still unable to join us. All of these precautions I took to heart very seriously for the safety of my patient and our children‘s health.  

Two months later Austin returned to a level 4 and quickly a level 5 and I had to tell the pastor that I no longer felt like it would be safe to conduct Godly Play in person again with the rise in cases and the severity of the Delta strain. These are by no means the only ways to keep our little ones safe and to keep spreading the stories of the Bible, but they were the ones I made for me and mine because I love these children and want only to do the best by them as much as I am able. 

Benita Alice “Allie” Barden, RN, Austin, TX

Principle 10: Older Adults Show Increasing Openness to the Online, Digital World for Faith Formation

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Post 11 of 11 in a series on the 10 Principles of Older Adult Ministry (banner image by Raul Petrie from Unsplash)

Not all older adults have the resources or desire to engage in an online world, but let’s talk about the ones that do.

When our building had to close in 2020, people of all ages had to decide how they could continue some of their favorite parts of church life. 

Our church had already been livestreaming one Sunday service for several years.  Many members had already figured out how to watch on a week when various reasons – health, weather, travel – kept them away from the sanctuary. Others had never considered worshipping in front of a tv or computer. 

 

Through guiding phone calls and even personalized video tutorials, families and friends reached out to help older adults learn how to connect.  Many had tablets or even Roku and just needed a little guidance to be ready for Sunday morning. This one step forward gave many people the courage to keep exploring and see how they could continue to connect. It seems that many have fully embraced faith formation in this new way and are encouraging each other onward. 

Our church began offering mid-week videos with prayers by the staff.  The Formation team created video Lectio Divina practice five days a week.  Many members visited the church website for the very first time in order to connect.  The weekly church email became a lifeline featuring links to these various offerings.  

Even the Monday morning prayer group – which has been around for decades – decided to give Zoom a try.  Members ranged in age from early 50s to late 80s.  The attendance has actually increased as those who weren’t necessarily morning people realized they could just roll out of bed and join in.  All winter long there was never a week we had to be concerned about icy roads and deciding if the group needed to be canceled.

The 8am Sunday morning adult education class also reached all time high in attendance with those non-early risers joining in.  The class leader could give the normal introduction to the day’s topic, share his screen to show documents and then divide the class into smaller groups for discussion.  

An evening Bible study that switched to meeting on Zoom has decided to stick with this virtual option into the future. Two members of the study made the big decision to move out of town to live near children during the pandemic. They are thrilled to remain connected to their old group because of this new way of interacting.

A sermon discussion group over Zoom is another way adults of all ages have connected. There is no book to try to order and organize.  The written text from the sermon is emailed in advance with numbered paragraphs to aid in the discussion.  There is also no worry about driving in the dark of the winter evenings.

Photo by Adam Nieścioruk on Unsplash

Our Theologian in Residence took what would normally be a 6-week evening study and created videos for an asynchronous offering.  Each week he posted a summary page and list of questions.  Discussion groups formed throughout the week on Zoom.  These series have been well received with all ages embracing this new digital option.  

Many older adults are grateful that the building closing for a time encouraged them to put fear aside and give something new a try.  They are in turn encouraging their peers to join this digital community and the possibilities seem endless. 

Ann VanMeter is a 26-year member of Second Presbyterian Church, Indianapolis, IN. She has served as an Elder, a Deacon, Bible Study Leader, VBS Chair, and is currently on staff in an interim position with the Formation team. She will happily tell you that she has church friends of all ages, ranging from 1 year old to 91 years old.

Honoring and Enriching the Lives and Spiritual Journeys of Older Adults

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In this post-pandemic world, it is more important than ever to intentionally engage in ministry with, and shaped for, older adults. Those without technology skills and equipment feel left-out. Those without families to encourage and surround them feel left-behind. Those outside thriving, connected, senior adult centers feel isolated. The places they called home, their church and the multitude of organizations of which they were a part, despite super-human efforts to stay connected in the midst of extraordinary circumstances, are just now beginning to open their doors and welcome them into the warm embrace of friends and stories and empathy and beloved community. What an opportunity to extend the reach of God’s love into a world of grief and mourning, fear and disorientation, longing and desire for deep connection!

Photo by Gabriel Porras from Unsplash

Who are these older adults and what engages their interest and commitment? Whether you define “older adults as 60-100 years, in categories of “mature” and “seasoned,” or as “elders” or “third-thirties,” there are 6500 more people over the age of 65 in America every day. These ten principles may offer you real keys to re-opening the doors of Christian community to them with renewed purpose:

  1. Older adults’ understandings of Christian faith vary significantly.

Expect a great variety of beliefs about God, who Jesus was and/or is, the purpose of the church, how faith might affect one’s life, the aim of prayer, and what death brings, amongst others.

2. Older adults enter our congregations with a variety of religious-spiritual identities and needs:

“…those who are religiously/spiritually committed and engaged in the faith community; [and] those who are less religiously committed and participate occasionally in the faith community.” In their circles of connection, our congregants will also encounter, “…those who have left established churches and religion, but are still spiritual and spiritually committed, [and] those who are unaffiliated, uninvolved, and claim no religious identity.”[1] 

3. Faith formation is concerned with all of one’s life.

This includes one’s physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual realities.

4. Relationship and community are key to adult faith formation.

Older adults find community in family, friends, “neighborhoods,” church, small groups, and social gatherings.

5. Diversity of programming provides the depth to engage a breadth of situations and circumstances.

This includes a great variety of housing situations, and “family” relationships.

6. Older adults have a variety of preferred ways of learning; but will try new ways to engage.

Pay attention to offering choices, and plan for many abilities and needs for accommodation.

7. Many highly significant life transitions occur in the last third of life.

These are key opportunities for fostering spiritual exploration, inviting growth, empowering resilience, developing coping strategies, providing special care, and connecting to a small group with similar changes or needs.

8. Multi-generational contact for learning and relationships are highly valued by many older adults.

These contacts are beneficial to all ages and stages for life-story telling, learning to be sensitive to others’ needs, discovering ways to love and care, working together on a task, and experiencing joy and delight.

9. Helping others is a deep desire of older adults.

When searching for or creating opportunities to help, consider accessibility for many abilities, meeting needs for contribution and caring, creating relationship with others that can be life-giving, finding situations where continuing partnership is both possible and desirable and mutual benefits are optimal.

10. Older adults show increasing openness to the online, digital world for faith formation. 

Advantages: Personalizing exploration and learning; offering a variety of entry points into learning; connecting isolated individuals though common interests; delivering content about every subject imaginable; guiding physical exercise, spiritual practices, worship, and training for particular ministries. But not every older adult has or is willing to engage with technology.

Each one of these principles offers rich opportunities to develop engagement and programming in conversation with older adults. Choose one or two that most describe your own context and make a fresh start in this post-pandemic world. Older adults are hungry for the Spirit, and the Spirit is willing and able to offer the food of community and connection that gives life.

A note from the editor: This is the initial post of an eleven part series. Each Tuesday this summer we will publish a post by a different author focusing on one of these 10 principles. We hope this enlivens your ministry with older adults.

Resources for planning ministry with older adults:

  • “Elders Rising” – Webinar “Ministry with Older Adults” with Dr. Roland Martinson (April 23, 2020)

Also, his book by the same name: Elders Rising: The Promise and Peril of Aging

“In this inspiring book, Roland D. Martinson draws on the folk wisdom and experience of over fifty persons between the ages of sixty-two and ninety-seven. He puts this wisdom in conversation with scriptural and theological understandings of elders in the last third of life and sets forth perspectives on aging for individuals, groups, civic organizations, and congregations to utilize in developing a vital, resilient, and productive quality of life for elders.”

  • The Seasons of Adult Faith Formation, Editor: John Roberto, LifelongFaith Associates, 2015.
  • 2020 Older Adult Ministry Planning Guide, Presbyterian Older Adult Ministry Network (PCUSA), which contains an annual Worship Outline for Older Adult Sunday (May 3rd in 2020). Free download on POAMN site.

Of special interest: Fall 2015 The Future of Adult Faith Formation

Winter 2016 Special Issues on Adult Faith Formation

Spring 2007: “Shaping a New Vision of Faith Formation for Maturing Adults: Sixteen Fundamental Tasks.”

  • On the Brink of Everything: Grace, Gravity and Getting Old, Parker J. Palmer, Berrett-Koehler Publications, Inc., 2018.

Joyce MacKichan Walker, Retired Church Educator/Pastor, Princeton, New Jersey

[1] “Twenty-First Century Adult Faith Formation,” John Roberto, page 2.

Youth Faith Connections for Mental Health

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In a previous article I lamented how this pandemic had exhausted me. At one time it had energized, but now I was just done. Not only are we dealing with our own emotions and fatigue, we have congregations to hold up, including youth and children that have gone through a traumatic year.

Milestones missed. Grades at risk. Athletic seasons wiped out. Friendships lost. An entire school year that did not match any that came before it. This is a lot on top of the stress that the tween and teen years can bring all on their own. We check in with our kids and youth, but sometimes we do not have enough time or the right timing to get into the deeper feelings they are having.

In my ministry I struggle with assuming needs. I absolutely want to fill needs, but I don’t ever want to assume what they need. What I see from the outside may not be what they are feeling inside. A few years ago I received a call at 10:30 pm on a weeknight. It was our parish nurse and she was with the family of one of my youth whose father had been released from the hospital to pass away at home from a glioblastoma. They figured it could be a matter of hours and our nurse thought I should be there for my youth, an only child at 14 years old. I went into panic mode. What was I going to say? What was I going to do? This was my first touch with death from one of my youth with a beloved parent and it sadly would not be my last.

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Is Everything Fine?

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Everything’s fine…

That is what I keep telling myself. The truth is that it is not.

I have no new ideas.

Asian woman with post-it notes all over her and her computer

 

I see your ideas on Facebook and hear them in Zoom meetings. I do. They’re great. I read them and feel like I am in 8th grade again and am jealous of Kristin’s Guess Jeans. I want a triangle on my bum, but my mom says I have to pay for half and I am lazy. I am jealous of the ideas, but am so burnt out right now.

 

Am I down on myself? For sure, but after meeting with the Hope4CE Steering Committee I know that I am not alone. We are all feeling it. Maybe you can’t pack one more bag, do one more porch drop off, edit one more video, look at one more poorly attended Zoom meeting. I am here to tell you that it is ok.

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Puppetry and The Pandemic

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I have learned many new technology skills during this time of physical isolation and virtual ministry. I’m sure you have, too. I’ve also discovered that I could reach back to skills that I haven’t exercised in a while that find new life in these challenging times.

One of those skills is the art of puppetry. I’ve always been enamored with puppets, since my time growing up with the likes of Captain Kangaroo, Shari Lewis, and later Fred Rogers and the Muppets. There is something magical that happens when you animate these pieces of fabric and stuffing into a living character with particular personality traits.

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FIG-Families In the Garden

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Is your church searching for a family activity that moves slowly into an expanded social bubble while providing an opportunity for the congregation to begin to “regather” in person on your campus? Why not be a FIG and DIG?

family in the garden (003)
Children of God, of all ages, are looking for ways to connect beyond screens. Church activities have been fairly two dimensional in the last few months. Now, we are all ready to head outdoors and back to working together doing kingdom work with kingdom hands. Second Presbyterian Church is reviving one such project called FIG. The “Green Team” tends the Northside Community Garden to provide fresh fruits and vegetables to the Northside Ministry’s Food Pantry. They collaborated with the Children’s Ministries Team to include members of all ages. Three years ago, a program called “FIG” began.
“FIG” is a collaborative partnership between the Community Garden and the Children’s Ministries program. It stands for Families in the Garden.

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Insights for Churches from Our Camps and Conference Centers

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As churches consider what it will look like to offer in-person programs for children and youth, you may want to gain insight from the experiences of others. While most of our camp and conference programs were cancelled due to COVID-19, some sites are currently offering face-to-face programing this summer. Here are just some of the insights shared by our camps and conference centers:

T-shirt front that says "Six Feet Apart but Closer than Ever" and has an outline of a camp saying "Summer Camp 2020" at the bottom.

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Connecting With Kids This Summer

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We are all coming up with NEW ideas to help connect with our kids and families this summer.  We may not be able to gather in large groups, but we can still CONNECT in creative and meaningful ways.

I have gathered ideas, suggestions and try-it’s to share.

This is a start; I am sure this awesome group of Ministry Leaders/Teachers/Educators will keep adding to the list.  Most of these you can do with a small group 3-5 people or families can meet up and participate as their own small group.

 

FamilyBikeRiders

*Meet up or Drop off (limit 3-5 people and observe social distance protocols)

  • Bike Ride
  • Visit a farm – the Bible uses a lot of farming and shepherding metaphors (ask the farmer to demonstrate calling animals for feeding time or how they plant a field or to explain what gleaning is)
  • Drive-thru farm (we have a few of these in Ohio)
  • Serve at a Soup Kitchen or Homeless Shelter
  • Petting Zoo
  • BinGO – Bingo in the church parking lot. Open the back of the mini-van or SVU, sit in lawn chairs near your vehicle.  Use a bull-horn to call #’s.
  • Movie – outdoors (bring your own blanket or chairs)
  • Book Club – read a book together and discuss in person or over zoom
  • Dog Show – dress up your dog, best groomed, tricks or agility (even if you don’t have a dog, it would be fun to come and watch)
  • Hike at a local park
  • Walk and meet at smaller/less known Nature Preserves
  • Kayaking or Canoeing
  • Video – send in a 60-second video of anything – blowing a bubble from bubble gum, cup stacking, playing the piano, reciting a poem, doing a trick on their bike, burping the alphabet…etc

*Disclaimer: I wouldn’t use the church van this summer but encourage parents to meet you or drop kids off for a designated work time.  I would also encourage mask wearing.

Low Touch or No Touch Games

  • Frisbee golf (each participant brings their own frisbee, or provide cleaning wipes)
  • Bocce Ball
  • Cornhole (make up new bags using ziplock baggies, easy to wipe down)
  • BadmintonWater fight (002)
  • Capture the Flag
  • Croquet
  • Supersoakers – water fight

 

Things I have been thinking about, but not sure how to do

  • Theology on Tap with Kids — Lemonade on the Lawn?
  • Some Good News – based on John Krasinski’s SGN channel – ask people to send in short videos of people doing good things (make a compilation video to share)
  • Mission UNTRIP – serve locally – dog shelter, resale or thrift shop, food bank, community garden, etc…
  • Unwind at 9 – a meet up time with parents to check in, share fears and hopes and connect

What have you been thinking about?

What can you add to this list?

Update in the comments – share your ideas.

jenni bio pic  Jenni Whitford is a Certified Christian Educator in the PC(USA) and Director for Children’s Ministry at Worthington Presbyterian Church (Columbus, Ohio), Member of Hope4CE Steering Committee

Daily Devotionals

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When I was an educator/pastor at the Nassau Presbyterian Church, the Adult Education Committee had the idea of creating a Lenten devotional, with daily entries written entirely by members and friends of the congregation. Guidelines for submission included a maximum word count, inclusion of a 2-3 sentence prayer and brief bio, and style suggestions such as preferred Bible versions for a brief selected quote and appropriately inclusive language for God and humanity.  This is not a unique or even a new idea, but two features of it, and a Covid-19 time expansion that grew from the practice this spring, may be developments worth noting.

The first year, 46 days of devotions, based on each person’s choice of text from the daily lectionary, were printed in a small booklet, and reproduced in large print. The latter were in such high demand multiple additional copies were printed. Older adults were enthusiastic users!

In subsequent years, these additional access points have been added:

  • Daily posts are sent by email (the first one automatically, subsequent ones to those who subscribe)
  • All are made available on the church website
  • All are posted in the early morning on Facebook

These two features have become very important to readers:

  1. The writer’s name and a short bio are attached to each devotion, primarily stating one’s involvement in the congregation
  2. Writer’s email addresses are provided so readers may write a note of appreciation or connection to the writer. Emails are listed in the print version only to protect privacy. Those using other formats may send an email forwarded by the church office.

In this spring of virtual worship and programming, connection is so important no one has wanted to stop receiving these after Easter, so the practice has been extended through the 50 days of Eastertide to Pentecost. No print version is available but all other ways of distributing the daily devotion continue. Volunteer writers are solicited and all submissions follow the usual guidelines and focus on a selected lectionary text for the day. (See below for an example of a recent Daily Devotional Post.)

Daily posts inspire faith and prayer, offer encouragement, and most important of all, create and nurture connection amongst the congregation, something worth valuing at all times, not just in this time.

Devotional Post Example 6-1-20

Joyce portrait

 

Joyce MacKichan Walker, Retired Church Educator/Pastor, Princeton, New Jersey