Żur il-Liturġija tal-Ħadd
Welcome, getting to know you
Scripture: Mark 10, 13-16
People were bringing little children to Jesus for him to place his hands on them, but the disciples rebuked them. When Jesus saw this, he was indignant. He said to them, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. Truly I tell you, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it.” And he took the children in his arms, placed his hands on them and blessed them.
Aim:
Prayer table:
Sign of the cross (catechist to use the left hand until the children learn how to make the sign of the cross properly)
Thank you Jesus, we are so happy to meet with all these friends and with you today. We want to become your friends. Amen.
Song:
‘Jesus loves me’ choose one : (version 1 / version 2.
Closing prayer:
Sign of the cross / Sinjal tas-Salib
Sign of the cross (catechist may show one of the above clips before the prayer to explain about the sign of the cross)
Thank you Jesus for … (allow children to say their names in turn)
Although we cannot see you, we know that you love us. Jesus we know that you can hear us and you can see us. We know that you are here with us. Jesus we want to become your friends and to love you daily more and more. Amen.
During this meeting, the children learnt:
Scripture: Psalm 139, 14
I am fearfully and wonderfully made
Aim:
Prayer table:
To prepare:
Sign of the cross (catechist to use the left hand until the children learn how to make the sign of the cross properly)
Thank you Jesus, we are meeting again today to get to know you better and also to meet with our friends. Thank you for helping us during this day, please be with us so that we allow you to speak to us through Ms/Mr (name of catechist). Amen.
Songs
‘God made me’ choose one : (version 1 / version 2)
Love the way that God made me.
Closing prayer
Sign of the cross
Thank you God for making me special. Thank you for making (allow the children to say the name of the person next to them) special. Amen.
During this meeting, the children learnt:
Dear parents, please make it a habit to praise the children for all the good things they do, for all the efforts they make, even the smallest things. They are still young and they are still exploring and learning about their talents. As parents you can help them in this discovery and you are also important in helping them develop their talents.
Today the children were each given a name tag. Please let them wear it for the coming meetings, so that we all learn each other’s names.
Scripture:
Mark 12, 30
Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.
Aim:
Children learn that
Things to prepare:
Prayer table:
Sign of the cross.
Thank you, Jesus, we are so blessed to be able to meet with our friends and together we learn how special we are to you. Today we are going to learn about saints. We too want to be good like them, we want to love you and obey you. Amen.
During this year, you are going to learn about different saints. Saints are people who loved Jesus. They also loved others, their families, their friends, their neighbours, they also loved those whom they did not know. They spoke about Jesus with others.
Saints were people like us, they ate, they slept, sometimes they were sad, others happy, they did things which they did not like, and they did other things which they enjoyed doing! They always did their best to do what Jesus wanted them to do. Saints are those people who are now in heaven.
Do you know any saints? (give the children time to name any saints they know)
Apart from these you mentioned, and others like (mention some saints which have not been included in the children’s list) there are many, many others in heaven. All those who die and go to heaven are saints. We do not know all the names of the people in heaven, for sure there are people whom we know, like our friends or relatives who have died.
We said that saints are people who try to do what Jesus wants. Can you name some of these things? (see that they mention: pray, love others, help others, forgive others)
Let us see how we too can become saints, how we can do what Jesus wants.
Show the pictures you have prepared, show also the bag (borza ta’ San Martin) and the dustbin.
St Martin is a saint, so we know that he did good things. When we have food which is not good, we throw it in the dustbin. So I am going to show you different pictures, and you will tell me where to put the picture. If it is a good action, which makes Jesus happy, we will put it in the bag, if it is a bad action we will throw it away in the dustbin! (Play the game)
Very well done, so now we need to remember that to be good children we need to … (get the pictures out of the bag, and show them to the children)
Let us now see the story about St Martin.
It is not always easy to obey Jesus. So, we need to pray and ask for his help.
Sign of the cross
Dear Jesus, we want to be like St Martin and share our things, but you know that we do not always find it easy to share what we have with others. Help us so that we become more like St Martin, help us to be generous and to try our best to make others happy. Amen.
During this meeting, the children learnt:
L-għan ta’ bekids.mt hu li joffri formazzjoni kateketika komprensiva għat-tfal u għall-adolexxenti li qegħdin jippreparaw biex jirċievu s-sagramenti.