Christian Formation
Find your place. Our formation programs offer a time and place for every age to be formed in the Christian faith. Formation is a valuable way to enliven your faith and come to see the meaning of the Good News in community. Much of the work of the Holy Spirit in formation is in forming relationships. We invite you to join us Sundays at 9:30 AM. The full complement of formation offerings is listed below.
Also, the clergy invite your feedback and suggestions for creating a new formation offering, so please share your idea with us.
SUNDAY MORNING FORMATION GROUPS
ADULTS
“Know your Neighbor” at The Sunday Forum
Leader: Fr. Biddy
Location: The Berlin Room
9:30 AM
Throughout the summer, we’re inviting some of the best organizations at work in our neighborhood to join us in conversation about their work, the needs and resources they see, and how we might deepen our relationship with them. These conversations will add new voices to our discernment, and it is our hope they will better equip us to proclaim the hope of God’s love to our neighbors. Mark your calendars for these important conversations:
June 25: Community Foundation for the CSRA
July 2: Child Enrichment
July 9: Compass for Hope
July 16: Hornsby Elementary
July 23: Christ Community Health
July 30: DCCM, Downtown Cooperative Church Ministry
Foundations of Christianity Inquirer’s Class: Newcomers & long-term members welcome
Leader: Fr. Bowden
Location: Zoom
Sundays, 9 AM
CHILDREN
GODLY PLAY — Children through 5th grade
Leaders: Kim Butler & Ivey Coleman
Email Maddy Elledge to request information about gathering.
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We take children and their relationship with God seriously and seek to provide both space to foster encounters with God and the language necessary to make meaning of those experiences. Within the Godly Play classroom, the Biblical narrative is lovingly presented to children using beautiful materials with an invitation to step into each story with awe and wonder. Children are then allowed time to respond to and reflect on their experience of the story. The Godly Play class sends weekly emails on Saturday morning. If you have children K-5th grade and would like to receive this email, please contact Maddy Elledge. |
Questions? Contact Kim Butler or Ivey Coleman
OTHER FORMATION GROUPS
YOUNG ADULTS
Saint Paul’s Young Episcopal Adults (YEA) offers a space for adults in their twenties and thirties to explore faith in our diverse and quickly evolving cultural climate. We welcome all young adults– students, the working, and the wayward souls into conversation around where God is calling this generation given the cultural and technological changes that have and continue to occur over the last 20 years. Saint Paul’s provides this space for individuals in similar life stages to be refined together as these generations take on greater leadership roles in the church and the greater community. Currently, we gather twice a month for:
YEA at a member’s home every fourth Sunday following the Celtic Service at 7pm. Contact The Rev. John Jenkins for location and directions.
For more information please email the Reverend John Jenkins at jjenkins@saintpauls.org
ADULTS
EDUCATION FOR MINISTRY (EfM)
September – May; Tuesdays 9 AM -11:30 PM; Sundays 6:45-9:00 PM
Mentors: Suzanne Pursely-Crotteau & Kathleen Chandler
Location: Tyler Hall’s Upper Room
Are you curious to explore the meaning of Holy Scripture, the history and traditions of Christianity, and our ever-changing understanding of God that you may more deeply and abundantly live your faith? Then EfM may be for you. EfM, developed by The School of Theology at Sewanee, is a small-group program (12 member limit) of study and spiritual growth open to ALL people. The complete program spans four years of weekly group meetings between September and May, offering the breadth and depth of our Christian tradition and bringing it into direct conversation with your personal experience of the world through study, worship, and theological reflection. Enrollment is between June and August for the following program year. Contact, Suzanne Pursley-Crotteau, or the clergy to have a full conversation. WE LOVE EfM!
BECOMING BELOVED COMMUNITY…WHERE YOU ARE
Ministry of Racial Healing & Justice & Reconciliation
TBD Date and Time
Leader: The Rev. John Jenkins
Location: Zoom
Why racial healing and justice? The answer is found in our baptismal identity, most fully articulated in our Baptismal Covenant (BCP 304-5). Why now? Because injustices long accepted as normal no longer are invisible or below our consciousness. The right time to “do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with God” always is the present moment.
This group is collaboratively working to shape their ministry. Everyone is invited. Drawing guidance from The Episcopal Church’s Becoming Beloved Community vision, we strive to: 1) tell the truth about our church and race, 2) proclaim the dream of beloved community, 3) practice the Way of Love in the pattern of Jesus, and 4) repair the breach in our institutions and society.
Email Fr. Jenkins to connect with the practice groups.
PRAYING TOGETHER
Schedule Varies. PLease check the calendar for sessions weekly.
Location: Zoom
PASSWORD: Email Maddy Elledge to request.
Episcopalians are a people of prayer. How we pray and worship proclaims and communicates more about our Christian belief and hope than can be found in theology libraries. Yet, how do we learn and grow in the living steam of our prayer tradition?
Praying Together offers informal and practical tutorials about prayer and our prayer tradition so that anyone may learn and grow in God’s grace through the prayers of our Church.
YOUTH
EYC (Episcopal Youth Community) Sunday Nights
See Calendar for Event Times and Dates
Over the past couple of years we have taken note of the often hectic schedules of our youth and their need for unstructured, yet formative time in our community. Given their need for freedom, we have allowed for EYC to be a time of prayer, freedom, and lots of fun. This inclusive space is welcoming for all– from the very loud to the very quiet. Our evenings range from movie nights with the opportunity to draw while you watch to Nerf Night’s when we take over the parish house and turn it into a maze of mystery! It is in these moments when boundaries lower and new friendships are formed and old ones deepened.
For more information on all of our youth opportunities please contact the Reverend John Jenkins at jjenkins@saintpauls.org.
