DEVELOPING CHILDREN'S LITURGY *E-BOOK* A Step-by-Step Guide Gail Fabbro PDF, $19.95 96 pages, 8½" × 11" ISBN 0-89390-702-0 Quantity: (see download instructions below)

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Here is a guide that helps any liturgy planner—even one without experience—put together a children’s liturgy at a moment’s notice. The core of the guide is a photocopiable liturgy planning worksheet that includes all of the elements of a coherent and effective liturgy. You'll learn how to select appropriate music, prepare the environment, and select prayers from available options. Plus you’ll learn the best way to involve children in the process. As a bonus, the book includes the entire text of the Directory for Masses with Children, the church document on which your planning should be based.

About the Author

Gail Fabbro currently teaches religion at St. Philip the Apostle parish in Pasadena, Calif., and is a member of the Religion Coordinator’s Council for the Archdiocese of Los Angeles. In the past, she has worked as a parish liturgist and has been a regular columnist for Ministry & Liturgy magazine, as well as writing for other Catholic publications. She completed graduate work in religious studies and liturgy at Mount St. Mary’s College in Los Angeles.

Purchase and Download Instructions:

To purchase DEVELOPING CHILDREN’S LITURGY *E-BOOK*, add it to your shopping cart above, and pay for your order by credit card. Click on the "DOWNLOAD" button on the order confirmation page to download the .pdf file and save it to a folder on your hard drive.

Once the e-book file is saved on your hard drive, you can open it as follows: From My Computer, or Windows Explorer, or My Documents, browse to the folder and double-click on the file named DCL.pdf. This action should launch Adobe Reader. You will see the title of the book, and you will be able to navigate the entire book. Note that bookmarks have been added to the file to make it easier for you to jump to what you want to use. If you do not have Acrobat Reader, it can be downloaded free of charge from www.adobe.com.

Table of Contents

Introduction: When You Know Absolutely Nothing about Planning Children’s Liturgy

Part I: In the Beginning
Part II: Catechumenate Period
Part III: Fully Initiated

Appendix A: Liturgy Planning Sheets
Appendix B: Celebrations Throughout the Year
Appendix C: Directory for Masses with Children

Following is the introduction to Developing Children’s Liturgy. All rights reserved. Copyright © 1999, Resource Publications, Inc.

Introduction: When You Know Absolutely Nothing about Planning Children’s Liturgy

This book is a practical guide to planning a liturgy with children. It does not presuppose that you know anything about developing a liturgy. It is a friendly book that will carry you along with ease.

This book is written for all those who pray the liturgy but have never planned the liturgy. It is for those who work with children in the classroom but have never worked with them in the church. This book is for those teachers who have just graduated from college and whose first job is teaching in a Catholic school. It is for those catechists in the religious education program whose experience has never included developing Masses with children. It is for anyone who needs help in the area of children’s liturgy.

Begin with the practical and the spiritual will follow. When your class is asked to plan a liturgy and your knowledge of how to do it is minimal, just pray and trust and read this book.

This book is divided into three parts: for beginners (and before), for catechumens (learners), and for the fully initiated, liturgically speaking. The first part is for those who have never, or have rarely, planned or developed a liturgy with children. This part uses a “trust” liturgy planning sheet found in Appendix A. This means that a person who has no knowledge of liturgy planning can take the sheet, trust it completely, and plan a liturgy for children. The ritual will speak and the experience will happen.

Many times we have to learn by doing, which may not be the definitive way to approach liturgy, but it may be all we have in the beginning. Because you have attended no in-service, class, or workshop that guided you along the path of children’s liturgy, you can rely on the first planning sheet to carry you through initially.

The second part, for the catechumens, helps you learn all you can about what is going on, and how and why and when. The third part, for the fully initiated, invites mystagogia and gives you the opportunity to continue the work you have begun and to put into practice all that you have learned. Remember, we must form ourselves before we begin to form the children.