I came across a blog entry that I thought had to be blogged again because it presents how we can present the liturgy to our children. The following is the link to the original blog:
"Making the Liturgy more "relatable" is the opposite direction one
should take in presenting the Church to your child. Holiness speaks to a
separation from the things of this world that distract us from God.
Using cultural distractions to encourage participation in the services
of the Church muddles this reality. If what we should be seeking after
is packaged in a secular pop-culture medium a false equality and
connection is made in the minds of our children that life in the Church
is just another way to pass the time. Making the Way into a video game, a
music video, or any other trivial entertainment serves to undermine and
not reinforce your child's faith. The hard lesson that evangelical
efforts to grow the Church through making it more "relevant" have been
learned over and over at the expense of tradition and with little to
show for it beyond empty coffers, infrequent attendance, and a
"spiritual but not religious" ethos.
The Liturgy is best presented as a constant walking towards the
transcendant where His people gather in reverence and anticipation of
His imminent return. A child that sees himself as someone in service to a
thing not only much greater than he, but also something that can
transform him into the man God would have him be through service to His
Church, is a child that will grow in faith and love of the Lord. "
"You may, being teachers, be interested to know how we teach our
faith. Well, I could put it in a nut-shell by saying, badly, because if
what I have said in the beginning makes any sense to you, it is not by
making children to learn doctrinal formularies or formal prayers or any
such thing that you make a person into a Christian or an Orthodox. He
must be introduced into an experience. And an experience can be caught
as one catches the flu, it is an infection, it’s not something which can
be conveyed in a sterile manner. So that what we expect is that in the
family people should have a sense of worship. I do not mean, do special
things. It’s not by praying before a meal or not praying before a meal
that one conveys a sense of a sacredness of the event, but I remember
one of our young theologians saying, “Everything in life is an act of
love divine even the food, which we eat, is divine love that has become
edible.” And if the food is prepared with love, if it is served with
beauty, if it is shared with reverence, if it is treated as a gift of
God, a miracle, and for people of my generation and that of my parents
this attitude is easy because we have gone so often without any food and
in hunger, that really a peace of bread or any form of food is an act
of God or an act of human love. So that is an example. The same could be
applied to everything which is the life of the home — the way parents
treat children and children treat parents."
+ Metropolitan Anthony Bloom, http://masarchive.org/Sites/texts/1900-00-00-0-E-E-T-EN05-023Othodoxy.html
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