ADULT
Formation
Growing in faith is a life-long journey and we offer many opportunities for adults to explore the Christian faith and discover how to live out their faith in the world. At Good Samaritan, we value questions, wrestle with doubts, and don’t settle for easy answers. Learning together in community helps us understand more about God, the world, and ourselves. Our formation opportunities for adults are safe places to wrestle with real life and discover how God is present through every stage, experience, or challenge.
Adult formation is offered in a variety of ways, including Sunday morning formation during the academic year, small groups, retreats, and weekly Bible studies.
- Sunday morning formation takes place at 9:00 a.m. except during the Summer. Contact Fr. Chris for more information.
- Women’s Group meets each week on Tuesday evenings at 7:00 p.m. Contact Cathy Strohl for more information.
- Education for Ministry (EfM) is a four-year program designed by the School of Theology at The University of the South. Contact Kimberly Kim for more information.
Current Adult Formation Series:
The fact of the matter is that there are a lot of strange things that Christians do. We sign our bodies with a symbol of capital punishment. We kneel and bow (and some even lay flat on the ground). We light candles and pray. We dress up a cup and plate. We shake smoke at one another. The priest washes their hands in front of people. We keep a cupboard just to store bread/wafers. Our main aisle is blocked with a tub of water. We have a fancy backdrop. Our priests and others wear white dresses (and scarves and ponchos and capes). We shake hands as part of our typical Sunday. And, we even keep a red candle burning all the time. Let’s explore these things and answer the often repeated church question: why do what we do when we do it?
January 5: Upper Body Gestures
January 12: Lower Body Gestures
January 19: Clothes
January 26: No Adult Ed, Annual Meeting and Potluck
February 2: Colors
February 9: Furniture
February 16: Other Things
February 23: Names and Organization
Past Sessions:
Previously we covered a broad range of topics. Here is a sampling of the sessions we had:
- The Power of Gratitude
- Monsters in the Bible
- The Story of the New Testament: Books and Readers in the Early Church
- Clobbering the Clobber Passages
- Miracles of Jesus
- Finding God Through Our Senses
- The Wild and Surprising World of Angels
- Light of the World: Looking at Advent with New Eyes
- Surprising Saints
- Habits and Spiritual Practices that Support Resilience
- Church History: A six week study of questions and issues with which the early Church had to grapple and how that influenced what we practice today
- Advent Series: The Proto-Evangelium and Its Influence on Tradition; The Voice of Isaiah; John the Baptist; and Poetry of the Incarnation
- What is a Priest?
- What is Happening at a Eucharist?
- Lenten Series on Prayer: Praying the Psalms; Praying the Old Testament Canticles; Different Methods of Contemplative Prayer; Poetic Language for God
- Church History: How the Romans viewed the Early Christians; How Christianity went from a Sect to a Major Religion
- Grappling with Racism within the Episcopal Church
- The Difference Course – a five week study exploring how to follow the example of Jesus within a deeply divided world
- How we Engage in Theological Reflection
