"There's nothing good the day can hold that cannot be prayer. Helping children to pray, not only with their lips and their hearts, but with their work and play and hurts and dreaming ~everything in their lives ~this is teaching them to "pray always."*
~Mary Reed Newland, in How to Raise Good Catholic Children
*1 Thess. 5:17
2 comments:
That is a beautiful quote. I was always so surprised (in a good way) at how well young children pray. I taught religious education last year and my first graders loved our silent prayer time. For the end of the year I made them all prayer jars (Mason jars with their names painted on and a little fabric on top of the jar with a hole where they could take out prayer requests). I gave them little pieces of paper and they wrote the names of friends and family and put them in the jar so that they could be reminded of the different people in their lives that they wanted to pray for.
Kate
What a great idea! Thanks so much for sharing it, Kate!
My little ones come up with very interesting prayer requests sometimes......esp. Boots. Before the family rosary one night he said he wanted to pray for "the mermaids"(this came from one of his favorite poems and we had to try and explain to him that they aren't real;) and the other night it was "all the BAD men who died in the wars":) Little ones are so sweet!
~Kate
Post a Comment