Fighting for the Continuing Faith of Our Children

Or, how do we ensure the next generations will follow Christ with all their hearts, souls, minds, and strength?

For the past few weeks, I have been thinking about a passage in the Gospel of St. Mark in the New Testament and its implications for our Syriac Orthodox faithful now and into the future. And, of course, its sister passage in Luke 10:25-37 was the reading for this past Sunday as we pondered the Good Samaritan during our Lenten liturgical worship.

28 One of the scribes approached and heard them arguing. Seeing that Jesus had given them a good answer, he asked him, "Which is the most important commandment?" 2 Jesus told him, "The most important commandment is: 'Hear, Israel: the Lord our God is one Lord; 30 and love the Lord your God, with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength? This is the most important commandment. 31 And the second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself' There is no other commandment greater than these." 32 The scribe said to him, "Well said, Rabbi! You have spoken truly, that Gods is one and there is no other beside him; 33 and that a person's loving him with all their heart, all their mind, all their soul, and all their strength, and loving their neighbor as themselves, is greater than all burnt offerings and sacrifices." 34 Seeing that the scribe had responded wisely, Jesus replied to him, "You are not far from the kingdom of God." And no one dared to question him again.
- Mark 12:28-34, Syriac English New Testament, Peshitta

I very purposely picked the passage from St. Mark’s Gospel. While not offering the parable of the Good Samaritan as the St. Luke passage does, which is good and beautiful in its own right, this telling of the scribe’s question leads Jesus to offer another reply: “You are not far from the kingdom of God.”

I have to admit that this statement was constantly baffling to me. What does it mean not to be far from the kingdom of God. As an evangelical in the past, you were either in or out of the kingdom. Of course, Orthodoxy brought me a different understanding of what it means to seek the kingdom of God through daily repentance, prayer, ascetical practice, and participation in the Church's liturgies.

More recently, though, I have been thinking about how many might sit in church Sunday after Sunday but may not be “close to the kingdom.” When we read Jesus’ word, four internal aspects of a human (who was made in the image of God) allow him or her to draw close to God: heart, mind, soul, and strength. This ultimately leads to loving our neighbors as ourselves. So why am I seeing a possible deficiency in our following God?

Much of this concerns what I see in our children and youth. Under the supervision of my priest, Abouna (Father) Abdelmesih, and the blessing of our Archbishop, His Eminence Mor Clemis Eugene Kaplan, I teach a weekly Bible study for my church in Phoenix. It was originally targeted at 16-to 30-year-olds but has drawn a slightly younger following recently. Sadly, most of the 16-to-30-year-old group is missing.

Preteens and early teens are joining, which is wonderful, albeit in some cases appears to be driven by their parents’ desire for them to learn about the Bible. We meet for about an hour on Friday evenings at 7 pm to discuss the following Sunday’s gospel reading. I try to explain much of what we are reading from the Old Testament context, which may not be visible upon first reading. Mostly, it’s me talking, but the attendees do ask questions along the way, which I love.

Yet, at the same time, the questions indicate a lack of prior exposure to biblical education. Some sample questions I received recently: “What is a Gospel?” - “How many Gospels are there and what are they called?” - “What is a parable?” - “Is the Holy Spirit a person?” (The last question is fundamental to the Christian faith but not easy to answer or understand, so maybe I’ll cut that some slack.) But not knowing what a Gospel is has me scratching my head at how much exposure my young people have had to the Bible.

I look around on Sunday mornings, and I would say that most kids/teenagers are not in the sanctuary when the Gospel is read. It is read in Arabic at my church. I know that other churches read the Bible readings in both Arabic and English, so this may be a local issue. Our young children are in Sunday School during the Holy Qurobo at my church, which is partially also since we have no building of our own and can only conduct church business during short hours in a rented church space. So again, maybe a local problem.

Some of the student workbooks for our Sunday School curriculum

The young children have a curriculum they are taught (and it is quite good, thanks to Patricia Allaf's work). Yet, the children do not experience the Holy Qurobo except when they are marched in to receive communion. I also notice that their exposure to the Bible is minimal, as evidenced by the questions above. This begs the question of what biblical training the families do at home or what they can do without church support, i.e., a biblical education for the parents.

During my dissertation research, I found that the no. 1 factor influencing a child’s early religious experience is their mother. So, in defense of our Sunday School teachers, they are only an afterthought after mom, dad, and priest, based on my research. This begs the question: How do we get the moms and dads to have a more solid biblical and Church Father understanding to feed the faith of the young minds?

And this leads me back to the passage above where Jesus tells the scribe he is not far from the kingdom because he has nourished his heart, mind, soul, and strength and loved his neighbor as he loves himself as an outcome. I am convinced that our hearts and souls will flourish when we spend time feeding our minds and, with it, the strength to love God. Call me a former evangelical, but I do believe spending time in the Word of God, aka the Bible, daily is super important to give us the discernment needed to both grow the love for God within us and to parse the world we live in, with the mind of God we can learn only from Scripture deeply embedded in our thought processes. That is the “mind” part Jesus mentions!

I want this to serve as a call to all of us who care about the future of our children and grandchildren in the holy and apostolic faith of the Syriac Orthodox Church of Antioch to work on solutions that help families become more grounded in the Bible and our Church Fathers. In my mind, we need a discipleship-making program for all ages. And yes, sorry, we need it in English, too! Where possible, having sessions to discuss the faith and Scripture should be offered in person regularly. Where distances make this complicated, such sessions could be provided online, as I do with my youth and young adult Bible study.

Based on my experience at an evangelical church, one thing that worked extremely well was using “The Story.” It was a Bible with all important passages retained, but with, e.g., lengthy genealogies or ritual worship prescriptions summarized and abbreviated, focusing on the passages that build a solid understanding of Old and New Testament. There was a whole curriculum for young and old, across all age groups, so families could read for their age group and discuss what they learned at home. Something similar could be created based on the Peshitta for a Syriac Orthodox context, including Church Father commentary to teach the ancient Christian understanding.

I am willing to work on materials to make this happen, but I can’t do it alone. So consider yourself invited to discuss further (yes, looking at any clergy/deacon/Sunday School teacher who might be reading this!). I love God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit way too much to risk losing generations who will be challenged by a secular world and need to be able to defend their faith, especially to themselves, when they go off to college/work without the protection of our beautiful Church. Let’s get busy!