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Hoosier United Methodist News Archives
| Hoosier United Methodists together |
January 2004 |
No one asked me, but ...
Have our Sunday schools failed us too?
By Bill Schwein
Let's be honest: It's not just our public schools that have failed us. So have our Sunday schools. If you don't believe me, just look around at the folks in your congregation. Many of them are members of the Sunday School Alumni Association. Yet, even after years of earning perfect attendance pins, starting way back with the Cradle Roll, how many of them would still think the epistles are the wives of the apostles?
There used to be an argument for improving adult education in the church that went something like this: "Jesus played with children and taught adults. We teach children and play with adults." I would argue that we are playing around with every age group these days. If you want proof, drop by any Sunday school class next Sunday. Chances are the children will be doing crafts or coloring, the youth will be planning their next lock-in and the adults will be engaged in conversation about IU or Purdue basketball. What we advertise as Christian Education in many of our churches is neither.
What will save the Sunday school? Better curriculum? Paid teachers? Bring back opening exercises? Perhaps we need a means of measuring the effectiveness of our educational program comparable to the ISTEP (Indiana Statewide Testing for Education Progress). We could require congregations to administer annual proficiency tests (with questions such as "List the Ten Commandments in order") and then publish the results in the annual conference journal.
An eighteenth century evangelical newspaperman, Robert Raikes, is generally credited for the creation of the Sunday school in Great Britain. Incidentally, it is not true that he came up with the idea because he owned a glue-and-glitter supply company. He did it in order to give moral and religious instruction to poor children on the day when most of them were not working. Maybe that's the problem. Today, youngsters are simply too busy on Sunday morning. We need to find another time that does not compete with football games, soccer tournaments, traveling hockey league trips, dance recitals, cheerleader tryouts, marching band practice, swim meets and karate lessons. In addition, the average Sunday school class is shorter than the time that it takes to get your pictures developed at the drugstore.
Even if we regained the children, I doubt if we'd find teachers for them. Remember when people would teach in the church school for years and years? These days, it seems almost impossible to recruit teachers for a month. I know of some congregations that have rotation schedules so that you only have to teach one Sunday every other presidential-election year.
We keep referring to children and youth as the "church of tomorrow." I worry about what we are doing with them in our churches today. At the risk of being taken seriously, I would recommend a new book. George Bush and Tim LeHaye have collaborated on a guide for Sunday schools, No Child Left Behind. You can pick it up at Cokesbury.
The Rev. Bill Schwein serves as pastor of Geist United Methodist Church in Indianapolis.
Last updated on 01/14/2004