Student Faith Formation

Parents are the first educators of their children as a God-given responsibility. They are the first to introduce the faith to their children. Parents exercise this fundamental responsibility with the aid and support of both the Church and civil community. Both have a vested interest and responsibility in education of young. Parents possess the fundamental right to choose the formative tools that support their convictions and fulfill their duty as the first educators.

See Code of Canon Law: Latin-English Edition: New English Translation (Codex Iuris Canonici [CIC]), (Washington, DC: Canon Law Society of America, 1998), canon 793; Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church, no. 240.

Elementary Faith Formation (K-5)

Tuesday Mornings 8-9am

St. Joseph Parish used the Word of Life program from Ignatius Press for grades K-5 Faith Formation.

An Integrated Approach to Catechesis

• An engaging and relevant kerygmatic catechesis young learners enjoy through a blended learning model of textbook, online learning interactions, and engaging video enhancements.
• State-of-the-art digital components allow young learners and parents to interact with dynamic faith formation materials in the classroom and at home.
• A teach-the-teacher model equips teachers to present lessons effectively and be more deeply formed in the faith as they teach. When teachers and catechists are formed well and passionate about the content, everyone wins.
• An authentic and comprehensive program for children and parents, providing a complete family faith formation with Word of Life materials and the expansive digital library of the Augustine Institute and Ignatius Press.

The Word of Life Student Text makes learning the faith effective, engaging, and fun with Bible stories, contemporary children’s stories, lives of the saints, and activities for a variety of learning styles.

The text consists of core lessons, as well as four liturgical season lessons. Images used in each chapter range from photographs depicting a real-life situation, contemporary art depicting a Bible narrative, and sacred art that depicts an event in salvation history to draw students into the mysteries of Christ, leading them to understand doctrinal elements of the faith more fully.

Every chapter has a page for parents that provides a brief summary of what the child learned in class and a variety of ways to live the faith in daily life.

Middle School Faith Formation

Sunday Afternoons 11:15am-12:15pm

Our Middle School program will be offered on Sundays 11:15am-12:15pm. This program will focus on the Holy Spirit, defending the faith, and personal commitment to the Church using the Decision Point program from Dynamic Catholic. Fr. Darrel will be the primary catechist for this program. Students will be in small groups of the same gender. We hope to have grade specific groups as well, however that is dependent on the number of student registrations we have.

High School Faith Formation

After speaking with several families and discussing what options are best to host Faith Formation, we have chosen to make an adjustment to our High School Faith Formation program. Students will be able to sign up for a session on a specific topic. Classes will be offered on Sunday night 6:00 pm, Monday night 7:15 pm, and Wednesday night 7:00 pm each with a different topic. Our year will be broken into four different sessions. The number of class dates in each session depends on the day of the week in which the class is offered, and other holidays and parish events are taking place at that time.

The first session topics include Sunday- Loving our Blessed Mother, Monday- Femininity & Masculinity- God’s plan for your life, and Wednesday- Exorcism.

To encourage our students to embrace their faith personally we wanted to allow them to help guide their faith journey. So, during the first session of the year the students who are participating will be asked to provide topics for the remainder of the year.

High School students will sign up for any classes they wish to attend each session. Students can choose more than one option as well. If a student has other obligations during that session and homeschool faith learning is a better option, your family can make that choice. Students can also choose different days of the week for different sessions to accommodate their busy lives.