How do you get to heaven? For adults, that’s a theological question, but for kids, it might be a matter of transportation – as in, is there a special bus or elevator to the great beyond?

Adults are paying increasing attention to what children think about spiritual matters, and that’s reflected in innovations in congregational practices as well as the growing number of books, conferences and research studies by theologians and social scientists. Many of these efforts are directed at learning how children come to faith and what helps them become responsible, ethical, caring citizens who are equipped to deal with the ups and downs of life. Parents face tough decisions: Do we raise our children in organized religion or go it alone? What defines community when family is far away? How do we talk to kids about natural disasters, school shootings, poverty and AIDS – all of which have children as victims? How do we help children sort out questions about evil and haves versus have-nots? The new focus on children’s spirituality is playing out in homes and faith communities across the country.

Why it matters

Almost 60 percent of Americans say religion is “very important” or “extremely important” in their daily life, according to a 2006 CBS News Poll. The increased focus on children’s spiritual formation reflects adults’ desire to help children acquire religious beliefs, to learn from children’s faith and to encourage children to be ethical agents in the world.

Angles for reporters

Children: The best way to report on children’s spiritual formation is by reporting on children themselves. Summer camps, Vacation Bible Schools, service projects and congregational activities offer opportunities to observe and talk with children. Many newspapers and other media have put together creative packages by asking children from a variety of faiths to draw pictures or take photographs that represent sacred or divine images to them. How have congregations changed their approach to children’s faith formation in the last decade? How do leaders say children have – or haven’t – changed over that time? How has parents’ involvement changed? (Journalists should take care to follow their media outlets’ guidelines on interviewing children and obtain parents’ permission when needed.)

Child theology movement: Some theologians have become interested in the theology of children – studying, for example, theological perspectives of children in the Bible or considering how theological topics might look through the eyes of a child.

• See the Web site of the Child Theology Movement and the Center for Children and Theology for resources and links.
• Read an essay by the Rev. Alexander Schmemann, a Russian Orthodox priest, on what it means theologically to “be like children.” It’s posted on Beliefnet.com.
• The National Association of the Catechesis of the Good Shepherd is a Christian organization that focuses on the religious formation of children using the Bible, liturgy and the educational principles of Maria Montessori. It’s based in Oak Park, Ill. Contact 708-524-1210, cgs@cgsusa.org.

Youth and religion: The National Study of Youth and Religion includes findings derived from a nationwide telephone survey, conducted in 2002 and 2003, of teenagers ages 13 to 17 and their parents, followed up by 267 in-depth interviews with teenagers in 45 states. The study includes reports on Protestant and Catholic teens, on the religious participation of American teenagers and on whether American young people are alienated from organized religion. Major findings were reported in the 2005 book Soul Searching: The Religious and Spiritual Lives of American Teenagers. The project’s co-principal investigators are sociologists Christian Smith of the University of Notre Dame and Lisa Pearce of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Contact the project staff at 919-918-5294, youthandreligion@unc.edu.

Indigo Children: Some contend that many children born after Jan. 1, 1978, are particularly spiritually sensitive. They’re called “Indigo Children” or Crystal Children, and some believe they come from other realms, can communicate across time and space, and bring messages from the world. Some say the strong-willed, creative Indigo Children are often mistakenly diagnosed as having attention-deficit disorder or placed on medications such as Ritalin. Adults have created special schools and camps for Indigos – hoping they will create a New Age of Peace as they become adults. Read a Jan. 12, 2006, story from The New York Times.

• See Web sites devoted to Indigo children – including one with a chat room for Indigos and examples of their writing.
• Read a column on Indigo Children from Beliefnet.com and another Beliefnet piece offering advice for Indigo parents.
• Doreen Virtue is author of The Care and Feeding of Indigo Children. Contact by email through her Web site or through Richelle Zizian, a publicist with Hay House, 800-654-5126 ext. 119, rzizian@hayhouse.com.

Raising ethical, caring children: Some parents are more concerned with raising “ethical” children than they are with teaching them a particular religious tradition. They focus on raising children with a strong sense of concern for the world – children who want to give back and make the world a better place.

• The organization Spirituality for Kids, for example, has “as its end goal the elimination of pain, suffering and hopelessness in the world.”
• Some parents feel that teaching their children about peacemaking and nonviolence is an important component of spiritual development. Read a June 2003 story from Natural Life magazine on “Talking to Children About War.”
• And for some, religious faith and justice are inextricably connected. Certain faith-based organizations center their work on helping the millions of children around the globe who are starving, suffering from disease, exploited or undereducated. For example, the Christian group Viva Network bases its work on the theological understanding that “God intends children to flourish in a just society.”

Secular children: Children of atheist and agnostic parents – or those who simply choose a hands-off relationship with organized religion – also consider the question of how to raise moral and ethical children.

• Camp Quest is a summer camp for “the children of atheists, freethinkers, humanists, brights or whatever other terms might be applied to those who hold to a naturalistic, not supernatural world view.”
• Dale McGowan, a writer and researcher from Georgia, is editor of Parenting Beyond Belief: On Raising Ethical, Caring Kids Without Religion, published in 2007. Contact 770-667-6347, dale@parentingbeyondbelief.com.

National sources

• The Rev. Jerome W. Berryman, an author and Episcopal priest, is director of the Center for the Theology of Childhood in Houston. He has developed an internationally used approach to religious education called “Godly Play,” inspired by the Montessori approach to learning, which teaches children through parables, silence, liturgical movement and sacred stories. This Godly Play approach emphasizes the idea of an orthodoxy that’s deeply rooted but open and creative. It’s used internationally by congregations (from Pentecostal to Catholic to Lutheran), in hospitals, homeless shelters and other settings. Contact 713-520-0111, center@godlyplay.org.
• Don Browning is the Alexander Campbell Professor Emeritus of Ethics and the Social Sciences and director of the Religion, Culture and Family Project at the University of Chicago Divinity School. The project explores contemporary family life and its relation to theology, culture, history, religion and law. Contact 773-702-9249, dbrowni@midway.chicago.edu.
• Marcia J. Bunge is professor of theology and humanities at Christ College, the Honors College of Valparaiso University in Valparaiso, Ind. She directs the Child in Religion and Ethics Project, funded by the Lilly Endowment, whose goal is to strengthen the theological and ethical understanding of children. Bunge is the editor of The Child in Christian Thought and co-editor of Children and Childhood in World Religions, to be published in 2007. Contact 219-464-6966, Marcia.bunge@valpo.edu.
• Robert Coles is a professor of psychiatry and medical humanities at Harvard University. A winner of the Medal of Freedom, Coles is the author of The Spiritual Life of Children and The Moral Life of Children. Contact 617-591-9389, rcoles@fas.harvard.edu.
• Mimi Doe is the founder of SpiritualParenting.com, a Web site dedicated to helping parents raise children who are happy, kind and “connected to their spirits and to their families.” Doe, the mother of two, is the author of Nurturing Your Teenager’s Soul: A Practical Guide to Raising a Kind, Honorable, Compassionate Teen and co-author of 10 Principles for Spiritual Parenting: Nurturing Your Child’s Soul. Through the Web site, parents have organized Spiritual Parenting groups around the country. Contact 978-369-7479, mimi@spiritualparenting.com.
• Naomi Drew, a consultant and author, stresses the need in a troubled and sometimes violent world for children to learn conflict resolution and peacemaking. A former teacher, she conducts workshops for parents and schools. Drew is the author of Hope and Healing: Peaceful Parenting in an Uncertain World. Contact 609-397-8432, Naomi@LearningPeace.com.
• Rabbi Marc Gellman is senior rabbi of Temple Beth Torah in Melville, N.Y. He has written several books of modern midrashim for children, including Does God Have a Big Toe? Stories About Stories in the Bible, and is author of the post-9/11 book And God Cried Too: A Kid’s Book of Healing and Hope. With his Roman Catholic friend Monsignor Thomas Hartman – with whom Gellman writes a weekly advice column and appears on a syndicated cable television show called The God Squad – Gellman wrote How Do You Spell God? Answers to the Big Questions From Around the World. Contact 631-643-1200, info@tbtny.com.
• Sam Goldstein is a neuropsychologist on the faculty of the University of Utah and in private practice at the Neurology, Learning and Behavior Center in Salt Lake City. He is the co-author of Raising Resilient Children: Fostering Strength, Hope and Optimism in Your Child and the forthcoming Raising a Self-Disciplined Child: Help Your Child Become More Responsible, Confident and Resilient. Goldstein can talk about how to raise children to be charitable toward others and to understand responsibility, and about raising children with challenges such as attention deficit disorder or autism. Contact 801-532-1484, info@samgoldstein.com.
• The Rev. Bonnie J. Miller-McLemore is the E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Professor of Pastoral Theology and Counseling at Vanderbilt Divinity School. A Disciples of Christ minister, she is the author of In the Midst of Chaos: Caring for Children as Spiritual Practice, published in 2006; Let the Children Come: Reimagining Childhood From a Christian Perspective; and Children in American Religions, to be published in 2007. Contact 615-343-3970, bonnie.miller-mclemore@vanderbilt.edu.
• Don Ratcliff is Price-Lebar Professor of Christian Education at Wheaton College in Wheaton, Ill., and an adjunct professor of educational studies at Talbot School of Theology in La Mirada, Calif. He posts a Children’s Spirituality Web page with links and resources, and he posts information on a Research on the Spirituality of Children class he taught. He has edited or authored more than a dozen books on children’s spirituality, including (as editor) Children’s Spirituality: Christian Perspectives, Research and Applications. Contact 630-752-5282, Don.Ratcliff@wheaton.edu.

• John Witte Jr. and Martin Marty were co-directors of The Child in Law, Religion and Society Project at the Center for the Study of Law and Religion at Emory University in Atlanta. The project sponsored 13 public forums and research from 2003-05, and the project’s Web page links to research and experts. Marty is also the author of a new book, The Mystery of the Child. Contact Witte, the Jonas Robitscher Professor of Law and director of the Center for the Study of Law and Religion, at 404-727-6980, jwitte@law.emory.edu. Contact Marty at memarty@aol.com.

Background

ARTICLES

• Read an April 3, 2007, Christian Century essay on the value of religious education and of teaching children to memorize the Bible.
• Read a March 7, 2007, USA Today story about Americans’ ignorance of religion and the push by some to encourage middle and high school students to attain “religious literacy.”
• Read the transcript of a Sept. 22, 2006, Religion & Ethnics Newsweekly show on what a chaplain at a children’s medical center has learned about faith from working with seriously ill children.
• Read a July 17, 2006, Newsweek article about summer camps that try to reinforce beliefs by teaching kids, alternately, creationism or evolution.
• Read a May 9, 2006, Washington Post story about parents who shy away from organized religion but want their children to have some introduction to it.
• Read a fall 2005 story from Christian Parenting Today (on the Christianity Today Web site) about how to teach children who run in a fast-paced world the concept of Sabbath rest.
• Read a 2004 publication about the spirituality of children from the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.).
• Read a story from Christian Reflection, posted by Beliefnet.com, on the value of teaching children about faith directly from the Bible.

Regional sources

IN THE NORTHEAST

• Thomas Groome is a theology professor and director of the Institute of Religious Education and Pastoral Ministry at Boston College. He is the author of Educating for Life: A Spiritual Vision for Every Teacher and Parent. Groome can speak about developing Catholic identity among young people, and the role religious education plays in forming children’s sense of faith. Contact 617-552-8449, Thomas.groome@bc.edu.
• Yvonne M. Vissing is a sociology professor at Salem State College in Salem, Mass. She is the author of Out of Sight, Out of Mind: Homeless Children and Families in Small-Town America, and can speak about the spiritual lives of homeless children. Contact 978-542-6144, Yvonne.vissing@salemstate.edu.
• Stephen Prothero is chairman of the religion department at Boston University. He contends that middle and high school students need to study significant religious texts to attain religious literacy, and he is the author of the 2007 book Religious Literacy: What Every American Needs to Know – And Doesn’t. Contact 617-353-4426, prothero@bu.edu.
• Sylvia Barack Fishman is professor of contemporary Jewish life at Brandeis University in Waltham, Mass., and co-director of the Hadassah-Brandeis Institute at the university. Fishman is the author of Double or Nothing? Jewish Families and Mixed Marriage. She can speak about the impact of intermarriage on Jewish family life and about how such families approach religion with their children; her research has included conversations with Jewish teenagers from interfaith families. Contact 781-736-2065, fishman@brandeis.edu.

IN THE EAST

• Geneive Abdo is a senior analyst for the Gallup Center for Muslim Studies, based in Princeton, N.J. Abdo is the author of the 2006 book Mecca and Main Street: Muslim Life in America After 9/11, which is based on interviews with Muslims and their families across the United States. She can speak about the increase of Muslim student groups and Islamic schools and about how some young Muslims are becoming more religiously observant than their parents. Contact through Christian Purdy in the publicity department of Oxford University Press, 212-726-6032 or Christian.purdy@oup.com, or info@geneiveabdo.com.
• Elizabeth Marquardt is director of the Center for Marriage and Families at the Institute for American Values, a think tank in New York. She wrote her master’s thesis in divinity school on “The Moral and Spiritual Experiences of Children of Divorce” and later helped conduct a national study of 1,500 young adults whose parents had divorced. She is the author of the 2006 book Between Two Worlds: The Inner Lives of Children of Divorce. Read a March 1, 2006, interview with Marquardt from Christianity Today in which she discusses the impact of divorce on the faith lives of children. Contact 212-246-3942, info@americanvalues.org.
• Thomas Lickona is a developmental psychologist and education professor at the State University of New York at Cortland. He also directs the Center for the 4^th and 5^th Rs (Respect and Responsibility), which emphasizes the development of character and ethics in children. He is the author of Character Matters: How to Help Our Children Develop Good Judgment, Integrity and Other Essential Virtues. Contact 607-753-2456, lickona@cortland.edu.
• Stuart Z. Charmé is a professor of religion at Rutgers University at the campus in Camden, N.J. For more than a decade, Charmé has interviewed Jewish children and teenagers about their religious beliefs and ideas – focusing particularly on how gender affects a child’s understanding of Jewish history and practice. Contact 856-225-6237, scharme@camden.rutgers.edu.
• Chris Boyatzis is a developmental psychologist who teaches at Bucknell University in Lewisburg, Pa. He has studied religious and spiritual development in families, including how teenagers talk to their parents about religion. And he’s worked in an area he calls “God in the Bod,” looking at how young people’s spirituality affects their body image and tendency toward eating disorders. Contact 570-577-1696, boyatzis@bucknell.edu.

IN THE SOUTHEAST

• Dr. Jim Tucker is a psychiatrist and an assistant professor in the division of perceptual dtudies, a part of the department of psychiatry and neurobehavioral sciences at the University of Virginia. Tucker has investigated reports of young children who claimed to have spontaneously recalled previous lives. These memories sometimes include detailed descriptions of people and places from other times, which turn out to be accurate for someone who actually died in another location. Tucker is the author of Life Before Life: A Scientific Investigation of Children’s Memories of Previous Lives. Read a September 2005 story describing the research – and outlining some of the cases – from WIE (What is Enlightenment) magazine, and a June 12, 2006, interview with Tucker from the San Francisco Chronicle. Contact 434-924-2281, jbt8n@virginia.edu.
• Karen-Marie Yust is an associate professor of Christian education at Union Theological Seminary-Presbyterian School of Christian Education in Richmond, Va. She is a minister in both the United Church of Christ and Disciples of Christ denominations and is the author of Real Kids, Real Faith: Practices for Nurturing Children’s Spiritual Lives. Yust can speak about the importance of such things as family rituals – lighting candles at meals or offering thanks – in helping children focus on God. Contact 800-229-2990, kmyust@union-psce.edu.
• Brett Webb-Mitchell, a Presbyterian minister, is founder and director of the School of the Pilgrim in Carrboro, N.C., which encourages people to experience pilgrimages and other Christian practices. A former president of the religion division of the American Association on Mental Retardation, Webb-Mitchell is the author of God Plays Piano Too: The Spiritual Lives of Disabled Children and the 2006 book Follow Me: Christian Growth on the Pilgrim’s Way. Contact 919-929-9064, bpmitchell@earthlink.net.

IN THE SOUTH

• Loren Marks is an assistant professor of family, child and consumer services in the school of human ecology at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge. Through the Faith and Family Project, Marks is doing research into how strong religious involvement influences Christian, Jewish and Muslim families. Contact 225-578-2405, lorenm@lsu.edu.
• Phyllis Mark is coordinator of children’s meditation programs at the Birmingham Shambhala Meditation Center in Alabama. The center offers programs for children to learn about Buddhism and meditation. See a Feb. 9, 2007, story from the Birmingham News, posted on The Buddhist Channel Web site. Contact 205-595-8757, phyljinpa@aol.com.
• Holly Catterton Allen is associate professor of Christian ministries and director of the Children and Family Ministry Program at John Brown University in Siloam Springs, Ark. She frequently speaks and writes on children’s spirituality. Contact 479-524-7298, HAllen@jbu.edu.
• Catherine Stonehouse is Orlean Bullard Beeson Professor of Christian Discipleship at Asbury Theological Seminary in Wilmore, Ky., and co-author of Children Matter: Celebrating Their Place in the Church, Family and Community. Contact 859-858-2343.

IN THE MIDWEST

• Dorothy C. Bass is director of the Valparaiso Project on the Education and Formation of People in Faith. This project, funded by the Lilly Endowment and based at Valparaiso University in Indiana, works to develop resources to help people live out the practices of Christian faith with integrity. Bass can speak about teaching children to resist the pressure to always buy more and do more – how families can learn to slow down, take Sabbath time and rest. Bass is co-editor of Way to Live: Christian Practices for Teens and of Leading Lives That Matter: What We Should Do and Who We Should Be, published in 2006. Contact 219-464-5034.
• Freda Shamma is a writer and curriculum development director from Cincinnati, and the mother of five. An essay she wrote, “Teaching Your Child About Islam,” encourages parents to be Islamic role models for their children and was presented at the annual convention of the Islamic Society of North America. Shamma can also speak about the role Islamic schools play in developing a sense of religious identity for Muslim children. Contact 513-791-7141, fshamma@aol.com.
• Annette Mahoney is a psychology professor at Bowling Green State University in Bowling Green, Ohio. She is co-director of the university’s Spirituality and Psychology Research Team (S.P.i.R.i.T) and conducts research on the role, both positive and negative, that religion plays in families and in the transition that couples make to becoming parents. Contact 419-372-0282, amahone@bgnet.bgsu.edu.
• Donald Ratcliff is the Price-Lebar Professor of Christian Education at Wheaton College in Wheaton, Ill. He is the senior editor of Children’s Spirituality: Christian Perspectives, Research and Applications, which summarizes presentations made at the Children’s Spirituality Conference in 2003. Contact 630-752-5282, don.ratcliff@wheaton.edu.
• Scottie May is assistant professor of Christian formation and ministry at Wheaton College in Illinois. Her emphasis is on children’s ministry, and her research includes how children come to faith. She is co-author of Children Matter: Celebrating Their Place in the Church, Family and Community. Contact 630-752-5976, Scottie.may@wheaton.edu.

IN THE SOUTHWEST

• Mollie Painton is a licensed psychologist and play therapist from Fort Collins, Colo., and founder of the SpiritPlay Institute. She is the author of the 2007 book Encouraging Your Child’s Spiritual Intelligence and says that spiritual children – compassionate and wise – can be healers and teachers for the world. Contact 970-482-5878, info@childrensspiritualintelligence.com or pmollie@aol.com.
• Mark Regnerus is an assistant professor of sociology at the University of Texas at Austin. He is the author of the 2007 book Forbidden Fruit: Sex and Religion in the Lives of American Teenagers and has done research on the influence of religion on adolescent behavior, including on delinquency, whether teenagers stay in school and what they think about sex. Contact 512-232-6307, regnerus@prc.utexas.edu.
• Marcia McQuitty, an experienced preschool educator, is associate professor of childhood ministry at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas. Contact 817-923-1921 ext. 3870, mmquitty@swbts.edu.

IN THE WEST/NORTHWEST

• Kevin E. Lawson is a professor of Christian education at Talbot School of Theology at Biola University in La Mirada, Calif. He helped organize a national conference in 2003 on children’s spirituality (such conferences are being held every three years, with the next one scheduled for June 2009) and can speak about trends in children’s ministry. Contact 562-906-4598, Kevin.lawson@biola.edu.
• Rabbi David J. Wolpe leads Sinai Temple in Los Angeles and is a former professor at Jewish Theological Seminary in New York. He is the author of Teaching Your Children About God: A Modern Jewish Approach. Read an article by Wolpe in which he discusses how adults can talk to children about God. It’s reprinted from jewishfamily.com and posted on the myjewishlearning.com Web site. Contact 310-481-3242, dwolpe@sinaitemple.org.
• Richard W. Flory is an associate professor of sociology at Biola University in La Mirada, Calif., and a research associate at the Center for Religion and Civic Culture at the University of Southern California. He has done research on adolescents and religion, including the importance of rituals for young people. He is the co-editor, along with Donald E. Miller, of GenX Religion, and helped create, in 2003, an interactive, multimedia art display about young people finding faith. Contact 562-903-4846, Richard.flory@biola.edu.