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Article

Names and Images of God

Fill in the three columns ("Names for God," "Images of God," "Feelings Evoked by Names and Images") for each of the age categories in which you have lived to date. In the "Names for God" box, list all the names …

Article

A Christmas Legend: The Birth of Jesus and Gift Giving

Session Overview: This 2-hour session is designed to use role-playing skills for a presentation to an audience. Scripture: This session is based on Luke 2:1-20. Read the Scripture passage to the young people after the role-play, "Christmas Legend," has been …

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Article

Ideas for Teaching Feminine Spirituality

In 1994, I started teaching a course on women's spirituality for seniors at Holy Names High School, an all-girls school in Oakland, California. Finding materials for such a class was a challenge. No textbooks or other resources existed that were …

Article

The Connections Binder: A Theology Project

The Connections Binder encourages students to find meaningful connections between the content they are studying in class and something from the world outside the classroom that they find interesting or appealing. I assign this project at the beginning of my …

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Using Literature in Theology Classes

Editor's note: The author of our feature article, Kathleen Hodapp, was one of the participants in last summer's workshop "The Catholic High School As Faith Community," held here in Winona, Minnesota, as well as on the East Coast and the …

Article

Service and Justice

We are standing on the brink, and our bishops are urging us to jump. Many of us don't know where we'll end up, and we aren't sure whether we'll land in one piece. Yet the sense of urgency is building, …

Article

A Thousand Teenagers Singing at Mass?

Every August, despite our enthusiasm to bring fresh ideas to our classrooms and curriculum, the same question lingers for us as we plan for another year of all-school liturgies: How do we get a thousand teenagers to sing at Mass? …

Article

A One-Day Retreat on Service in the Inner City

Our sophomore class day retreat focuses on finding spirituality in the inner city. It is a kind of "urban plunge" experience within a spiritual framework, and students go on this retreat during the same semester that they take a social …

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The Harvest Is Abundant: Reflections on a Spirituality of Service

Service is a golden word these days. Everybody's doing it: governmental bodies, schools, churches, even neighborhoods and families. Court sentencing frequently includes community service, the federal government holds service up as a value in programs such as Americorps, and state …

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Methods That Tune In to the Students' World

Jack Kelly, who teaches religious studies at Saint Albert High School in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, offers us thoughts on how to engage students, using the contemporary media that are so familiar to them. The textbook, chalkboard, and teacher remain valued …

Article

To Teach as Jesus Did: A Teacher's Reflections

"To teach as Jesus did." It's a phrase that must have been tucked away somewhere in my mind because it sprang to consciousness when I was asked to consider writing this article. "To teach as Jesus did." What an awesome …

Article

Leading Students to Hermitage:

Editor's note: A few months ago I met (by mail and phone) Sr. Mary Farrell, SC, who has taught at Saint Peter's High School in New Brunswick, New Jersey, for thirty-six years. Much of that time, she taught French and …

Article

Forms for the Hermitage Experience

For more information see Leading Students to Hermitage. Preparation for Hermitage Dear __________________________, Your day for hermitage is _____________________ in the MORNING at 8:00 a.m. or AFTERNOON at 1:40 p.m. To come to hermitage, you must do the following things: …

Article

Story Collections for Classroom Teaching and Youth Ministry

The following is a list of story resources and collections for teaching or ministering with teenagers. [Editor's note: See the article "Helping students Get the Most Out of Stories" for ideas on using these stories with young people.] Most items …

Article

Helping Students Get the Most Out of Stories

For the past six years I have been researching the power of stories for communicating Catholic religious and moral values. At the same time, I have been experimenting with stories in my high school classroom (tenth- and twelfth-grade classes in …

Article

Building Faith Community in the High School

In a workshop entitled "The Catholic High School as Faith Community," religion teachers, campus ministers, and school administrators discussed, among many things, the obstacles they face in trying to build faith community in their school. One obstacle they addressed was …

Article

Gospel Values Across the Curriculum

Given the current educational climate in our country, most schools are making a concerted effort to create a clear vision for education that will carry them into the twenty-first century. That forward-looking "visioning" and "refocusing" for the future includes an …

Article

The Power of Parables

We all know that a good story will almost always act as an excellent springboard for reflection. Jesus' most effective teaching tool was the parable. He would gather his disciples and tell them a story with a message that moved …

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When the School Play Becomes a Faith Experience

As a teacher in a Catholic school, I have always been concerned with trying to demonstrate to my students how, in a practical way, Catholic values and the Christian worldview are relevant to their lives. A Catholic school does not …

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Growing as a Faith Community

Over the past nine years as a campus minister and theology teacher at Saint John's Jesuit High School in Toledo, Ohio, I have witnessed and been part of the growth of our school toward the ideal of being a Christian …

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Schoolwide Prayer in the Words of "Me"

What distinguishes a Catholic school from a public school? The obvious answer is that, at least potentially, a Catholic school is a faith community. Whether it is truly a faith community depends on more than the offering of religion courses, …

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Pulling Threads: Unraveling the Scriptures

Young people, and adults as well, often feel inadequate when reading the Scriptures. Many believe that the Bible is something you only hear in church, not something you read on your own as well. They fear misinterpreting it or not …

Article

Stations of the Cross by Students: New Light on an Old Tradition

A pilgrimage is a journey to a sacred place, undertaken for a spiritual purpose. A pilgrimage in our modern age could take many forms. For the season of Lent last year, I invited my junior ethics classes to make a …

Article

ROCKS

"God, being a teenager has so many ups and downs, so many vital decisions. It is a time when the pressures of one's peers are at a high, and the choices that are made will inevitably follow people throughout their …

Article

Questions for God

In a course on faith that he teaches at De La Salle Academy in New York City, David Detje, FSC, uses the film Oh, God! to shake up the students' notions of what God is like. He has gotten some …

Article

Lessons from an Inner-City Parish High School

Saint Paul High School in San Francisco, where I teach, is an inner-city parochial school. It is a school that, for all its shortcomings, has much to teach other Catholic secondary schools, precisely in view of the two attributes cited--namely, …

Article

Taking Off on the Ten Commandments

This classroom strategy is based on a method used by Fr. Steve Brice while teaching religion at Aquinas High School, La Crosse, Wisconsin. Young people love humor and satire. One way to alleviate pressures students feel from the culture around …

Article

The Quincentenary

As we are all aware, 1992 marks the quincentenary of Christopher Columbus's landing in the West Indies–thus, the "discovery" of America. For religious educators, this anniversary offers an opportunity to examine the injustices done to Native Americans by the colonizers …

Article

Using Imaginative Retellings in Teaching the Bible

Biblical stories have been imaginatively retold over and over again for centuries. A particular type of retelling, in which students assume the role of a biblical character then retell the story using a first-person point of view, has proven effective …

Article

Once Upon A Time: Using Student-Generated Stories in Religion Classes

Religion classes should be interesting, if not compelling, and they can be if what is interesting is determined by the students. This, of course, is not a new approach. Learner-centered educational theories have been popular for decades. Using story as …

Article

Introductory Activities for Teaching Christology

Mimi McCaul, who teaches at La Salle High School in Pasadena, California, passes along to you some of the strategies she uses in the course Jesus of History, Christ of Faith. Thanks, Mimi! Introductory Activity On the first or second …

Article

Expect Much, Praise Much, Be Present to Them

Course materials, such as the high school religion textbooks and teacher's manuals published by Saint Mary's Press, are a significant ingredient in the education of our young people. But we all know that the most important factor in a student's …

Article

Kinds of Relationships

Margaret Kueberth, a religion teacher at the Catholic High School of Baltimore, passed on two of her exercises that can be used in a sexuality or lifestyles course. The first exercise, which can be made into a handout, serves as …

Article

The Mirror Has Two Faces

We live in a culture obsessed with sex, and our students soak up that message in music, television, and film. I am astounded at how explicit the sexual dynamics, innuendo, and situations in typical teen dramas (witness "Dawson’s Creek," "Felicity," …

Article

Curriculum Offerings of Theology Departments

For a couple of years, Saint Mary’s Press sponsored a listserv discussion group online. Discussions on a variety of topics were pursued via e-mail. In this section of the web site, I summarize some of the highlights from these old …

Article

A New Look at the Sower and the Seeds

This is the text of a reflection given at the opening prayer service of the school year. The concept is interesting and could work well in a classroom or retreat setting. Scattered them wildly about (see Matt. 13:1-53; Mark 4:1-34; …

Article

Praying the Psalms

Remember the television show from the late 80's called "Doogie Howser, M.D.?" At the end of every show, Doogie would sit down at his computer and write a 2 or 3 sentence "blurb" that perfectly summed up his day and …

Article

Four Writers of the Pentateuch

This is a good activity for getting students thinking about the importance of context when reading scripture. I use it as a starting point to address the four writers of the Torah (Jahwist, Elohist, Deuteronomist, Priestly), but it would serve …

Article

Block Scheduling Tips

For a couple of years, Saint Mary's Press sponsored a listserv discussion group online. Discussions on a variety of topics were pursued via e-mail. It is my hope that I can summarize some of the highlights from these old files …

Article

Back to School: Beatitude Jingles and Cheers

Jesus taught us what happiness is all about in a Christian lifestyle and summed it up in the Beatitudes. Many people know the Ten Commandments by heart, and that is great. But as a Christian, we should also know the …

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