Welcome!

This blog is being set up to summarize lessons in Church of the Savior's ("COTS," in Ambrige, PA) Catechesis Class, primarily for students who miss a class. This is an original curriculum, though it borrows from several resources. This first class (begun July 11, 2010) is a pilot program; we'll see how it goes and how it needs to be tweaked for future students. The plan is for the class to go a full year, but we got a bit of a late start, so we're going to try to get through all of the material in about 7 months. Not everyone in the class is expected to be confirmed--that is a decision the student, the teacher, and the student's mentor will make with the rector when the time comes--but for any who do wish to pursue confirmation, we hope to cover everything by the time the Bishop visits in February or March.

The first four sessions are somewhat introductory; students will be asked at the end of these whether or not they wish to officially enter the Catechumenate and commit to the full program (including mentoring). More on that in upcoming posts.

Anyone who is not in the class may feel free to follow along and make appropriate comments. I trust we will all learn a lot over the course of this program.

Godspeed!

--Dana
Director of Christian Formation
Church of the Savior
Ambridge, PA

Session I - Part 1 "Teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you" (Matthew 28:20)

We are all familiar with "The Great Commission" which Jesus gave his disciples just before his Ascension back to heaven. We usually hear it in the context of missions conferences or exhortations to evangelize, focusing either on the parts where he says "Go into all the world" and/or "Preach the gospel." We may remember "Baptizing" is in there somewhere, and when we feel overwhelmed we might remember the "Lo I am with you always" part. In practice, too often, we envision it in terms of a Billy Graham crusade, and see the goal as one of making decisions (i.e., getting people to walk an aisle, come down front and pray to "get saved" as the culmination of the commission), rather than making disciples. Disciples aren't made overnight; it's a process over time, and it involves teaching, commands, and obedience. This, we're not so good at; but it's what Jesus commanded.

So, one of the things we're going to focus on in this class is looking at the commands that Jesus gave. Not that God didn't give other commands through Moses, David, Paul and others who wrote the books of the Bible, but if we're going to be disciples of Jesus, then focusing on what he commanded seems a logical place to start.

Being in the Anglican tradition, we have a Daily Lectionary (in the back of the Book of Common Prayer, or available online at various sites, including http://satucket.com/lectionary/ ) which includes a reading from one of the Gospels for each day. For the duration of this course, I am asking that we all read these Gospel lessons for each day of the week, and come prepared to discuss them. Our discussion will naturally involve determining what are direct commands, what are indirect commands, to whom each command is given, and if--and how--each command is to be obeyed by us as Jesus' disciples today.