Faith Formation

To Register for 1st Communion the following criterion must be met:

  • The child has been baptized in the Catholic Church,
  • The child is in second grade or higher,
  • The child has participated in at least two years of religious education in either a parish or Catholic school program.
  • The child’s family is registered at St. Vincent de Paul parish.

When is the Orientation Session for the Parents?

Parents must attend the orientation session in November. A definite date will be provided on the first day of class. Check the bulletin and website for more information. At this session, parents will be given an overview of the Sacramental Preparation Program and a review of the requirements, as well as a chance to ask any and all questions.

 Curriculum by Year

  1. Introduction to God, the life of Jesus, and prayer, with a special emphasis on growing to know, love, and trust God.
  2. Immediate preparation for the Sacraments of Confession and Holy Communion. Emphasizes God’s mercy and love by covering creation, commandments, and redemption.
  3. God’s plan of salvation, from creation to the Incarnation and Redemption to Pentecost and the Church. Expands on the importance of Confession, Communion, and Mass.
  4. Cont. God’s plan to save us from sin (salvation history), our participation in God’s plan through His Word, Law, and Church. Help students understand their purpose in life, and how God helps lead us all to Heaven, our true, eternal home.
  5. Thoroughly studies the articles of the Creed as the basic belief of our Catholic faith, with a special emphasis on the prophets and prayers of the Church.
  6. Growing in holiness by following the law of God, focusing on the Ten Commandments. Teaches about God’s law and His gifts of grace to help us fulfill His law. Emphasizes the presence of Jesus in the Holy Mass. 
  7. Emphasizes the transmission of sanctifying grace through all the sacraments. Studies God’s revelation of Himself through the prophets, the Incarnation, and the Church. Students learn that sacraments are indispensable to a full Christian life, and how grace works in our soul and how to grow in virtue. 
  8. Explains the history and structure of the Church—its founding by Christ, its birth in the Holy Spirit, the marks of the Church, and the saints. Explains the Magisterium, the role of the clergy, the religious, laity, and our own vocations. 

The textbook will be assigned to your child on the first day of class but it must be returned at the end of the year to be used for next year. This will help us keep the cost of the program down. The activity workbook is for your child to keep. Please make sure that your child does all the assigned work before each class and brings his/her books to class each week. All homework will be checked in class for completeness by the catechist’s assistant.

 Let the children come to me and do not prevent them" Luke 18:16

The purpose of the Faith Formation office is to assist parents in their responsibility to educate their children in the Catholic faith. The parish will do so by providing formal classroom instruction in the ways of the Catholic faith using the Faith and Life Curriculum for children grades Kindergarten through 8th grade. We will also develop a curriculum for parents to help them with this important job.

The Role of Parents

The Catholic Church considers the parents to be the chief catechists for their children:

“Parents above others are obliged to form their children by word and example in faith and in the practice of Christian life; sponsors and those who take the place of parents are bound by an equal obligation.” Code of Canon Law 774-2

Excerpt from the Rite of Baptism of an Infant. When your child was baptized you took upon yourself the responsibility of teaching them to love and practice the faith. 

Priest or Deacon: "You have asked to have your child baptized. In doing so you are accepting the responsibility of training him/her in the practice of the Faith. It will be your duty to bring him/her up to keep God's commandments as Christ taught us, by loving God and our neighbor. Do you clearly understand what you are undertaking?"

Parents:  "We do."

We can never replace the Parents in the carrying out of their responsibility. It is essential to the child's growth and development in the Catholic faith, that the Parents live the life of faith in the home. The effectiveness of the catechetical process radically depends upon this. For example, the children learn in their religious education classes that celebrating the Eucharist on Sunday with the faith community (that is the local parish) is essential to being Catholic. When parents "sleep in" instead of attending Mass, their actions speak louder than their words. The values of Parents become the values of the child/ren. The child/ren are then receiving a "mixed message" and statistics demonstrate that it is the Parents' beliefs they will absorb and follow.

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