Children’s Religious Education at Pathways

At the present time, children stay with their families during our Common Ground at 10am on Sunday. We are planning to re-open our nursery for babies and toddlers from 9:30am – 12:30pm each Sunday. If you need nursery services to attend our Common Ground service, please contact our office at office@pathwaysuu.org with the subject line “Nursery.”

SUNDAY SCHEDULE:

10:00am – 10:30am Conversation and Coffee

10:30am – 11:30am Common Ground service

10:45am Religious Education for all youth

11:45am – Adult Small Groups

All our children’s religious educators and helpers undergo background checks to ensure children’s safety.

As a Unitarian Universalist church, Pathways children’s religious education aligns with the Unitarian Universalist Association (UUA) philosophy. This excerpt from the UUA website about the philosophy of Children’s Faith Development articulates our Pathways goals for children’s religious education: “Parents and caregivers come to Unitarian Universalist (UU) congregations for communities that help raise children to become kind, respectful, fair-minded, caring, and strong enough to side with love and fight for justice. UU religious education and participation in worship, social justice work, and multigenerational gatherings reinforce what parents teach at home. We nurture truth-seeking, spirituality, and progressive moral values that will continue to shape and support our children as they grow.” (Excerpt from this link)

Our elementary-aged children at Pathways curriculum often includes material from Soul Matters. One of its programs aims to deepen our children’s understanding of our diverse world. The program provides a religious timeline, which includes origins of different religions and encourages acceptance of many different cultures. In recent years the children have learned about Indigenous religions, Hinduism, Judaism, Confucianism, Jainism, Zoroastrianism, Taoism, and Christianity. Enrichment activities in years past included field trips to Hindu and Buddhist temples. Youth group material has followed the Soul Matters curriculum called Crossing Paths.