DAY 1: Vacation Bible School 2009

St George Antiochian Orthodox Church and Annunciation Greek Orthodox Cathedral team up each year to host Vacation Bible School. This year, we’re at the Cathedral with a Group curriculum: “Paul and the Underground Church”.

Fr John Salem, Fr Nicholas Hadzellis and I are teaching the kids about the ancient Church (through prayer, song, and chat): using water, oil, wine, incense, and bread.

Today, we did water.

Q&A;, especially with the youngest youth, is always unpredictable. Fr Nicholas wound up with some answers to his questions today that were a hoot.

1) When defining “holy”, Fr Nicholas asked if the kids had ever heard about Moses and the Burning Bush. Some of them had, but he reminded them of the story a bit and then asked: “Why did God, speaking through the Burning Bush, ask Moses to take his shoes off?”

One kid said: “Because … he was on fire?”

Ba-dump-bump!

[We priests got a chuckle about that after the group left … From the Burning Bush: “Stop, Drop, and Roll”.]

2) A later group of kids was providing answers as to the various uses of water in the Church when Fr Nicholas asked: “Did you know that the priest pours hot water into the Chalice prior to Communion?” Some did, others did not. He continued, “Do you know what the priest says when he’s doing this?”

A boy said: “No. I don’t know … because I don’t go to your church.”

Heh!

Another said: “Yeah, that’s what we do our my house!”

(As you can see, one can learn a lot at VBS. 🙂