Saskatchewan
anglican
The newspaper of the Dioceses of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon and Qu’Appelle • A Section of the Anglican Journal • October 2021
Bishop's road trip a chance to connect with parishes By Mary Brown
We want to see Jesus
Kids in Faith Quest at St. Mary’s, Regina, act out the story of the friends who lowered a man down from the roof, so he could be cured by Jesus. Photo by Kate Berringer
Faith Quest a valuable experience for all By Kate Berringer REGINA — This past spring, St. Mary’s, Regina, completed the 19th year of its Sunday morning Faith Quest program for seven to 12 year olds. I recall being approached in 2002 by our rector to join a team of interested parishioners to look at a new Sunday school model that had begun in the United States in the 1990s. It was developed by two Presbyterian children’s ministers who were faced with many problems that so many parishes experience: low Sunday school attendance, bored teachers, bored kids, lessons that were often
“moral”-based curricula and that superficially touched on Bible principles and stories. This prompted them to develop a new way of doing Sunday school, the Workshop Rotation method. Faith Quest began at St. Mary’s in the fall of 2002 and is modelled after this method. We reconfigured the church basement and created spaces for each type of workshop we chose to offer, and there were many! Our kitchen became the Daily Bread Bistro for cooking lessons. We repurposed some old Globe Theatre seating and created a Pray-Per-View audio-visual workshop
area. Volunteers constructed a drama area and a space for computers, transformed one old Sunday school room into an “Oasis” tent-like gathering space and the other room into a messy, well-stocked Let There Be Art room. The goal of the program is to teach a series of Bible stories or topics over a six-year time period with a view to imprinting them on the hearts of the children and thereby deepening their relationship with our Lord. Each Bible story is taught over four to five Sundays. Each Sunday, the kids learn the story or topic through one type
of workshop including: cooking, computers, watching/critiquing movies, drama, art and games. We have also included workshops on science and music on occasion. The appeal of the program is that several people are always involved. Faith Quest roles require low commitment such that no one person is doing all the work. Some years, we had 20 to 25 people involved, planning lessons, gathering materials for specific types of workshops, leading and shepherding during lessons. The “shepherds” Continued on page 5
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PRINCE ALBERT — I volunteered to be the designated driver for Bishop Michael Hawkins on Aug. 9. At that time he felt he was not ready for a long road trip. So I picked him up at 7:30 a.m. and we headed to All Saints Church in Melfort where he conducted a communion service. It was so touching to see the sincere happiness and concern for their bishop on the faces of the parishioners. I realize that when I visit Anglican churches I see so many people I knew for many years. On the way to Melfort we talked about who would be there. The bishop had to remind me about names and places I would have known like the back of my hand a few years ago. He had no problem bringing me up to date. You remember the names of lay readers and Order of Saskatchewan recipients. Karen Price Jones, Grace Ellis and John Wikstrom come to mind. I saw a familiar face I usually saw in the Leask church, Billie Caspell, who had moved to Melfort. There were a number of cards on a table for certain people. I found out that a woman named Georgia Jardine started giving cards to people on their birthdays and anniversaries about three years ago. We had to leave soon after the service to get to Tisdale for their 11 a.m. Holy Communion service. Continued on page 6