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Friday
Jun122009

a great week with many highlights

Kate Harborit's been a great week with so many highlights! i'm praising god for this week - and excited to continue following him in this new adventure.

this week - i spent time working in my office while my niece kate played on the floor next to me. an ideal working situation!

i had lunch yesterday with my friend lou ann, children and family director at vale community church - as always, i was filled up and inspired by all of lou ann's dreams to impact children in her community!

i had several great meetings with potential partner organizations - i'm excited to partner together with others who are passionate about changing the future of church for children.

and i imagined new ways for inspiring children's leaders with customizable training and speaking events. i'm looking forward to sharing more on this soon!

and of course, i was reminded that ministry is always better in team - with partners and friends you can trust, respect and share common vision and purpose.

what was the highlight of your week?
Tuesday
Jun092009

wii vite

wii-logo.jpgfor christmas, my parents gave us a wii vite - an invitation to come over for dinner and play an entire night of wii. this past weekend was our official wii vite, so after our delicious dinner my husband and i chose our games from a very long, extensive list - we settled on yoga (from wii fit), pole vaulting (from wii olympics), and mario kart.

all of this wii playing got me thinking again about the way in which wii has changed the culture of video gaming for our children. larry shallenberger recently blogged about the 10 most influential people creating culture for our children, #4 on the list is shigeru miyamoto who was a lead designer behind the Wii motion-controlers. no one can deny that amongst the benefits of the wii is the physical fitness and creativity that inspire children as they play. but what about the ways in which the wii is re-defining social connectedness for the millenial generation? with the expansion of online gaming, children are now able to play wii games with other children from all over the world - most of whom they will never meet. similar to facebook and twitter, our children are living very public, online lives.

is wii another expression that defines this generation?
Monday
Jun082009

we believe...a child protection preamble

my church recently went through a process to re-evaluate the effectiveness and relevance of the child protection policy we were using in our children's ministry.  as a group, we concluded that the policy could use some updating, thus launching our several month process as a work group - researching, discussing, formatting, experimenting - and of course, eating pizza as we worked late into the night.  i'm so proud that we've finished the new policy - and this week will launch our training and implementation of the policy.

one addition that we made to the policy is the following preamble that we included on the first page. we felt that it cast great vision for the value of children in our community.

Preamble


because we affirm that


all children are a gift of God,


created by God and created good;


all children are a gift


to the whole of the human community;


all children have a real faith


and gifts for ministry;


all children have the right to be children.




therefore


we hope for a world


where all children can find a safe place;


where all ages, races, genders, creeds, and abilities


are recognized, valued, and celebrated;


where all adults hear the voices of children and


speak with, as well as for them. . . .




[we must remember that]


Jesus welcomed children and encouraged us to


welcome them in his name;


Jesus lifted up a child as an example of


what the Realm of God is like.





from the opening preamble of “a vision for children and the church”


by congregational ministries division.  adopted by 205th general assembly of pc (usa)




i especially love the words: "where all adults hear the voices of children and speak with them, as well as for them.." what a beautiful picture of a faith community in which adults serve as both friend and advocate for children.

Friday
Jun052009

easy training for busy volunteers

i love these training videos with ivy beckwith. they are short (3-4 minutes each) - and easy to pass along to volunteers to watch at home. the whole series of videos can be found on the willow creek association online training channel. what are some new methods you are using to train busy volunteers?

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Synonr1wS1s&feature=related]
Tuesday
Jun022009

elevating the conversation

Love Is An Orientationi've just finished reading love is an orientation: elevating the conversation with the gay community by andrew marin. i've been looking forward to reading this book ever since i heard about the work andrew does with the marin foundation.  the book has been meaningful to me on a lot of different levels - but specifically i've been thinking about how we can build bridges in our children's ministry for glbt (gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender) families.


if david kinnamen's research is true - that christians are perceived as homophobic and judgmental towards the glbt community, and that this is a contributing factor for children and youth walking away from the church - then something has gone terribly wrong. and it's time for those of us in children and family ministry to elevate the conversation.


"out of twenty attributes that we assessed, both positive and negative, as they related to christianity, the perception of being antihomosexual was at the top of the list. more than nine out of ten mosaic and buster outsiders (91%) said "antihomosexual" accurately describes present day christianity" (unChristian p.92).




in his book, marin sites research done by the williams institute and the urban institute: more than 65,000 adopted children are living with gay or lesbian parents in the united states and over 14,000 foster children (that's 3 percent of all foster children).  the average age a person know his sexuality is 13 and 16 is the average age for a student to come out about his/her sexuality.


it's time for those of us working in the church with children and family to elevate this conversation. it's time for us to build bridges towards glbt parents, to resource and encourage them as they lead the spiritual formation of their children. and it's time for us to create a church environment in which children are safe and loved as they explore their sexuality. i know this won't be easy, and that we have a lot of work to do in order to answer so many questions - but i'm committed to this, i want to do the hard work and i want to create a new church culture for families so that the spiritual formation of children applies to all children.


i encourage you to pick up the book and contribute to the conversation - it's just that important.