Welcoming Community with A Call to Faith Formation for Young Children

My daughter leaned on a piece of playground equipment catching her breath between sobs.  She had lost a toy ring while playing by some climbing tires and I had not been able to help her find it.

“It’s okay,” a friend about my daughter’s age consoled her with both concern and confidence.  “Just pray to Jesus.  He will help you find it.”

I smiled.

It’s not on every playscape that you’d find one preschooler comforting another by suggesting prayer.  Likewise, it’s not every day that I am able to arrange a get together with faith-filled friends.  However, on this day, everything came together to create the perfect moment – a moment when one child offered a testimony of faith to another and this mom recognized anew the importance of fellowship.

In person, on the phone, online… for both parents and children, spending time with like-minded folks is important.  In today’s world, which often seems to emphasize the secular over the sacred, I feel it is particularly important  to seek out friendships with those who are not afraid to talk about God and to live, as best as they can, according to faith principles. 

In training up my children to know and love God, I treasure the examples of faith and the sense of communion that comes through socializing with our Catholic and Christian friends.  For, where I value all of our friends, no matter what their faith beliefs are, I am particular touched when experiences such as the one with my daughter and her friend at the playground unfold.  When the Spirit moves one child to guide another in a sort of peer-faith formation, is truly beautiful.  Having a community of Christian friends to share with is such a gift.

Learning from my children and their friends, I have decided to open up a weekly link-up here on our Sunday series, Training Happy Hearts: A Call to Faith Formation for Young Children.  It is my hope that by doing so, we might do a bit of peer-mentoring ourselves.

Should you write a post about a favorite resource, tip, tale or testimony for guiding young children in their faith formation, I encourage you to share a link. That way, even if we cannot meet on the playground, we can glean from each other’s grace-filled moments.  And, of course, if you don’t have your own blog and would like to share, please feel free to do so in the comments.

Have a blessed week!