Our good friend Rev. Barb Cairns in PEI shares with us an agape feast for Sunday School.
She writes that due to coronavirus, on Worldwide Communion Sunday (Oct. 3, 2021), “our children and Sunday School teachers [shared] the great feast together during Sunday School”. Children were invited to think about the connection between meals shared with their families and friends, and what it means to share a meal as the Family of God.
Rev. Barb has shared the activity information with us which she adapted from Whole People of God from the Presbyterian Church of Canada. You can download a copy of it to use at home or in your faith community below.
We love this activity because it connects to a long standing Christian tradition: the Love Feast. Also known as an Agape Feast, or Meal, these were different from the Eucharist Banquets, focusing on fostering fellowship and connection within the Christian community. Learn more.
So, for those lay leaders who are wary of practicing communion with children either because they do not have a sacraments license or they are concerned about parents who may feel their child is not ready to partake (a discussion for another time) know there is indeed a rich history of non-communion feasts in our faith. Indeed, orphans and other vulnerable members of society were often centred at these meals.
This is a meal that can be down in Sunday School, in churches when there is no clergy or Sacraments Elder, at small group, youth group or in your home. There are no rules surrounding a Love Feast, but there is power in naming what you’re doing together and sharing the stories of other love feasts from our faith tradition, and scripture.
Does your faith community share in “Love Feasts” with one another? How do you engage children in the sacrament of communion? Let us know in the comments.
