A Strong Foundation
Each child has a unique way of viewing the world through their own innate sense of spirituality. Adults who are willing to encourage children to explore and develop at their own pace and in their own way can assist in building a strong foundation that will stand firm even in difficult life experiences.
Your Presence Matters
Children need multiple intergenerational relational connections to thrive spiritually.
A faith community is also an excellent resource. However, a few hours each week spent in a religious service is not sufficient to meet the child’s spiritual needs. Touching a child’s life with an intentional focus on helping them grow spiritually can make the difference that propels a child into a successful and joyful adulthood.
Respond with Confidence
Our resources can equip you to strengthen a child’s human spirit. We offer ideas for responding to their deeper and often difficult questions about God and life. You’ll find conversation starters that help children develop a moral compass to guide their choices.
Available Now in paperback and Kindle on Amazon!
A new book written by Janet Logan and Tara Miller, Child-Centered Spirituality: Helping children develop their own spirituality is a valuable resource to help adults — both parents and other caregivers — develop and guide children’s innate spirituality. We encourage open dialogue and exploration as children engage in their own journeys of ongoing discovery.
As adults, we need to help children foster their own sense of spirituality even if it makes us uncomfortable, and even if we run the risk of them coming to different conclusions from our own. Our role is not to make their choices for them — which we cannot do anyway — but to guide them in their own unique process of spiritual development.
This book is not only for parents, but also for grandparents, godparents, teachers, friends of the family… anyone who has important children in their lives whom they love and in whom they want to invest. We are firm believers that it takes a village! This book is for people who believe it’s important to create space for children to process the big questions in life.
Children wonder about God. This book does a great job of helping parents know what to look for, and how to respond to, kids spiritual development.
This is not a theology book. It provides prompts and ideas for families to see where God is at work, and learn more about him. Whatever your beliefs about God, you will find insights to get a conversation going. Easy to read, and good prompts ( chapters are split into age brackets). I’ll use some of the tips with my grandkids.
I think this work will be tremendously helpful to parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles …. anyone who spends quality time with kids! As a Christian, I appreciate your book so much to help me start conversations, remember my own young journey to share with my grandkids, and be more prepared to respond to the amazing and deep questions that they ask.
Child-Centered Spirituality is for:
- People on the whole spectrum of religion — Christian, Muslim, Jewish, Buddhist, Hindu, etc.
- Nonreligious people who are fairly certain God exists
- Those who aren’t certain if God exists
- The open-minded, which is different than undecided
Child-Centered Spirituality is not for:
- People who are anti-religion or believe spirituality is bad for children
- Fundamentalists of any branch who believe that questioning or exploring is wrong
You can have opinions and beliefs yourself and still be open-minded that other traditions may have something to offer as well. In this book, we encourage children to ask questions… even when those questions make us squirm… because we believe it’s in their best interest to have dialogue and think through these things. We desire to help you engage in open dialogue with the children in your life, whether you have a formal or well-defined set of beliefs or not. Child-centered spirituality affirms their natural seeking behavior.
Child-centered is exactly what it sounds like: it’s not about us as the adults, but about the needs and desires of the child. Our goal in this book is not to shape, influence, or manipulate children, but to honor what God has already placed within them.
Sample questions to build childhood spiritual development
I get to drive one of the children in my extended family (age 6) to her weekly ballet class. It’s fun to have a few minutes each week of one-on-one time with her. I try to think of one question that might lend itself to a spiritual—or heart—conversation, amid the...
Blog’s 5th anniversary and 5 answers
When did you realize you wanted to blog? When I finished writing Child-Centered Spirituality but before its publication, several smart people recommended that I start a blog so that I’d have a place to raise issues around the subject. How did you feel when you started...
My Christmas-Hanukkah story
“Who can tell us what Hanukkah means?” asked Ms. Simon my third-grade teacher one long ago December day. My hand shot up eagerly and I started into the story of how Judah Maccabee led a revolt against the Syrians. I continued with descriptions of the dreidel game and...