Every Saturday we have a jammed packed day with activities for children. Children from Pumpėnai and the surrounding villages come to the IVE parish for several hours. The girls start coming around 1pm. We begin the afternoon with a little girls group called Daughters of Mary. The goal of the group is to promote devotion to Our Lady and teach the girls girly things like cooking, sewing, arts and crafts, etc. Every week we talk about and explain one of the mysteries of the Rosary and then pray a decade of the Rosary.
Right after the Daughters of Mary we have First Communion class. This year we have 20 kids from the parish preparing for First Holy Communion.
After that we have Oratory. It‘s based off of St. John Bosco‘s method of the oratory, that the children will learn virtues and about the faith in an atmosphere and spirit of family. We split the kids into two teams, this year our team patrons are Bl. Francis and Bl. Jacinta, the little shepherds of Fatima. Last year the patrons were St. John Bosco and St. Dominic Savio. It is amazing to see how over time the children change and grow and learn to work as a team. One of the most attracting moments of the oratory is homemade pizza before they go home.
Last year during the oratory we organized different activities to get the children’s families involved. We had a feast for St. John Bosco, our patron, and a mother’s day party. Here in Lithuania as in many places mother’s day is very important. The girls prepared bouquets of paper flowers for their mom’s during Daughters of Mary and different kids prepared songs, poems, etc. to present during the party. All the moms came to participate. Much to our surprise before the Mother’s day party many of the children and moms asked if the dads could come. So at the end of the year we had a BBQ for the whole family. It was beautiful to see how the families participated and take interest in the activities of their children.
We hope to imitate the example of St. John Bosco and help the kids in our apostolate to become holy children of God and upright citizens. Please pray that God will give us the grace to do so.
From the land of the Crosses
SSVM Lithuania