Faith-Full Families is a fun faith-development program where parents and their young children learn about Christian values through song, projects, and prayer. The projects and songs are directed at children ages 3 to 11. Families with any children in the 3-11 age group are encouraged to attend and may bring their younger or older children. Siblings under 3 won't understand the whole evening but they will enjoy the family focus and begin to join St. Jude's community of youth. The program content is aimed at children under 11 but older kids may enjoy being role models while helping their younger siblings or other children during the events. We are thankful to the Child & Family Institute in Menlo Park for creating and teaching us to run this program.
A typical Faith-Full Families evening includes: a greeting/gathering time with games for children, prayer before a potluck dinner, a family project tying the liturgical calendar to the "Hallmark" calendar, and a closing/blessing with songs. A key component of the projects is that they are designed to be used at home for the subsequent month, thereby tying the day-to-day family life closer to the worship activities of the church. This is not an "if I can make it" program. Faith-Full Families have committed to meet for two hours, one Sunday evening each month, from October through May. Participants have praised the program for building family identity, inclusion of the whole family, reinforcing St. Jude's community, and since young children are involved, the commitment to finish on time so bedtimes are not disrupted.
Faith-Full Families began in 1998 at St. Jude's. Some families have "graduated" as their children have grown but we're thankful that the number of participating families has increased each year. Our roster currently has about 50 people with more than half of those children under 11.
This year we are adding a concurrent event for middle school children on the same nights as Faith-Full Families. We will eat together, but the middle schoolers will join Pastor Dawn for some special activities.
Assignments Calendar and Matrix from
2007-8(a
pdf file)
FaithFull Families Task Descriptions (a
pdf file)
| Updated 3/11/08 |
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