Formation Resources

Individuals and organizations curating a variety of formation programs and materials.

• Building Faith: Published by Lifelong Learning at Virginia Theological Seminary, with a mission to equip and inspire churches and individuals for the ministry of Christian education and faith formation.
• Children Formation Curricula Overview: A simple comparison chart of a variety of curricula; developed by Sharon Ely Pearson, the Christian Formation Specialist for Church Publishing and updated annually.
• ChurchNext: ChurchNext provides engaging and convenient online learning from Episcopal experts on liturgy, evangelism, welcome, discipleship, stewardship, and other important topics.
• Church Publishing: Offers a number of print resources for purchase.
• Episcopal Church Foundation: is an independent, lay-led and inclusive organization that helps build, vitalize and transform Episcopal faith communities focusing on formation, finance and resources. ECF also offers resources in Spanish.
• [email protected]: Developed by Forward Movement and Forma, [email protected] offers resources to help build at weekly discipleship practice of Reading, Reflecting, and Responding to scripture in the context of community is so important.
• Faith Formation Learning Exchange: Organized by different ages and groupings, offers current research, effective practices, and models in faith formation
• Forma, the network for Christian formation professionals
• Forward Movement: Offers numerous formation resources and curricula.
• Grow Christians: An online community of discipleship focused on the practical details of life at home. Gathering reflections, stories, images, and recipes from diverse Episcopalians, this group blog inspires generations to come together as they celebrate the presence of God through the Christian year.
• Lesson Plans that Work: Each week, you will find a lesson plan for young children, a lesson plan for older children, and usually a lesson plan for adults. Inter-generational lesson plans are available for many major feast days throughout the liturgical year. Most lesson plans are based on the Gospel, and some also have an Old Testament Lesson Plan.
• Ministry Architects: Ministry Architects is a team of almost 90 pastors, teachers, executives, youth workers, children’s pastors, writers, and professors seeking to help ministries find clear direction and sustained momentum backed up by properly aligned resources.
• Mockingbird Ministries: Mockingbird is an organization devoted to “connecting the Christian faith with the realities of everyday life”. This site is one of our chief venues for doing so. We also publish books and magazines, host conferences, and distribute podcasts.
• Pathways for Baptismal Living: educational resources curated by Bexley Seabury.
• VTS Lifelong Learning: Lifelong Learning provides continuous opportunities for theological education in the service of faithful leadership. Lifelong Learning at VTS is a multi-faceted program grounded in theology and research-based practices to provide transformational learning for courageous leadership in a changing church.
• Vibrant Faith helps Christian churches develop effective faith forming approaches that embody both historic practices of Christian formation and address changing cultural realities.
• Yale Youth Ministry Institute: The mission of the Yale Youth Ministry Institute at Yale Divinity School is to promote adolescent faith and flourishing in a diverse and changing world by conducting scholarship, equipping leaders, and resourcing collaborative communities in and beyond Christian churches.

A selection of programs available for use.

• A Christian Life of Faith: Signs and Thresholds along The Way: This booklet is for individuals seeking to deepen their understanding of themselves and God as well as those responsible for passing on the teachings of the Church.
• Centered: A Christian Discipleship Experience: Centered is a discipleship series guiding small gathered communities to get deeply rooted in love with God and one another, so that we all may grow to look, act, and love more like Jesus. The experience includes an initial three-session training for group facilitators, followed by nine core sessions during which church members, neighbors, and friends gather to share a meal and grateful prayer; view two short films, discuss questions about God, belonging, and living a meaningful life; and support for each other in committing to intentionally follow Jesus and his Way of Love.
• Confirm not Conform: Confirm not Conform is a confirmation program that celebrates questions and choices. It provides a safe place for young people to explore the breadth of the Christian tradition, to ask questions and express their doubts, and to discover what they truly believe.
• God's Word, My Voice: A Lectionary for Children by Lyn Zill Briggs. This collection of the Revised Common Lectionary readings is paraphrased for children. Read aloud in Sunday morning worship, it will help kids read the word of God and understand its meaning for their lives.
• Good Book Club: This Forward Movement initiative invites organizations of all kinds to read a particular book of the Bible throughout a liturgical season.
• Household Bible Reading with Lectio Divina: Introduces families and small groups to the practice of studying the Bible using Lectio Divina. “Sometimes the Bible can be confusing and difficult to understand. With Lectio Divina we give ourselves permission to let the Bible be what it is. Questions will undoubtedly surface. If you like, search for the answers. Seek out conversations. Or simply let the questions be.”
• Journey To Adulthood: Journey to Adulthood is an online, downloadable youth ministry program of spiritual formation for 6th-12th grades. Fully revised and updated, it is centered on inclusive, relational ministry and uses Bible study, prayer, rites of passage, and outreach ministries. Creative, developmentally appropriate lessons are arranged within three categories of Self, Society, and Spirituality. J2A is divided into three sequential modules: Rite13 (ages 11-13), Journey To Adulthood (ages 13-15), and 4Ward (ages 15-18).
• Love First: The Love First program (and now its own organization, The Love First Project) was started by a husband and wife team – a family therapist and Episcopal priest – and the busy parents of young children who wondered if the busyness was helping them raise the loving, kind children they’d intended. Love First works to increase the volume on love and kindness, teachers are finding it intuitive and rewarding to teach, children are hearing and seeing that love is important, that their love matters, and that they can have a positive impact on the world, and, the Church has found a way to make religion, God and faith an integral and meaningful part of children’s everyday, busy lives.
• Peer Ministry Leadership: PML provides skill-based and developmentally-appropriate leadership programs and leader support.
• The Work of the People: The Work of the People is a series of videos on topics ranging from beauty and justice to identity and vocation. Many of the presenters are well-known: Barbara Brown Taylor, Brené Brown, Brennan Manning, Richard Rohr. The videos provide thoughtful reflections that can be used as content for a faith formation series. The Work of the People starts at $7/month for a personal subscription and goes up from there. Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark is a six-part series for Lent and includes a discussion guide.
• These Are Our Bodies: These Are Our Bodies addresses foundational issues for how we are called to have conversations about our sexuality within a faith community. The program modules are divided by age groups: preschool and elementary (ages 3-11), middle school (ages 12-14), high school (ages 15-18), young adults (ages 18-30), and a forthcoming adult module for ages 30+.
• Traveling the Way of Love: This resource comes straight from Presiding Bishop Michael Curry. While meant for group discussion, this one can be studied individually or used as journal prompts.

Online, downloadable, or available-to-purchase materials to enhance your ministry.

• d365: d365 is a daily devotion written for youth and adults written by ministers, professors, students, teachers, missionaries, denominational leaders, and others who work with and care for students. Typically, an author writes on a single theme for one week.
• How2charist: A digitally instructed Eucharist and could be a great activity to learn about all that goes on during a church service.
• Illustrated Ministries: Creates illustrated resources for the church and the home, encouraging creativity and active engagement with faith.
• Preparing for Sunday is an easy and affordable way to post weekly NRSV lectionary readings on your own church website.
• StoryMakers NYC is dedicated to creating new ways to share God’s redemptive narrative found in the Bible. Their hope is to equip families and churches to be able to share the Gospel with kids in a way that is meaningful, healthy, and ultimately draws children into God’s story through magazines, memory cards, playbooks, and vibrant visuals. StoryMakers gives kids and grown-ups the chance to connect while exploring the greatest story ever told. Together with a team of artists and writers, StoryMakers creates content that engages the minds and imaginations of children and adults. StoryMakers is partnered with Mockingbird Ministries.
• United Thank Offering: The United Thank Offering (UTO) is a ministry of The Episcopal Church for the mission of the whole church that invites individuals to embrace and deepen a personal daily spiritual discipline of gratitude. In addition to grant opportunities, UTO also provides formation resources for children and adults.
• Vibrant Church Communications: Beautiful seasonal resources available for free or for purchase.

Living Well Through Advent

A free, downloadable devotional from Living Compass. It's also available in Spanish, in print, and has marketing and images for social media available to download.

Make Something Beautiful (SALT)

A customizable short film that can be tailor made with your church name and worship times, making it easy to extend the invitation to your community.

Gathering to Write: an Intergenerational Advent Practice

Gathering to Write is intended to be a multi-generational, four-week Advent practice for small groups from Building Faith. It uses the Advent C lectionary texts, but is adaptable for Advent A or B.

Jesus Storybook Bible Advent Guide
Zonderkidz and author Sally Lloyd-Jones are making this Advent toolkit and printables available to you for FREE through FaithGateway! Each day for 24 days you can make an ornament that corresponds with one of the stories in the Bible, then read the companion story in The Jesus Storybook Bible. It's super easy and fun for the entire family!

Holy Land Advent Calendar
Beginning on December 1 AFEDJ’s Holy Land Advent calendar will give you a daily glimpse into the lives of Holy Land Christians and the humanitarian ministries of the Episcopal Diocese of Jerusalem.

Waiting & Watching: Advent Word Reflections
Savor and steep your Advent journey in the Word of God. Drawn from the weekly scripture readings, these daily devotions offer an opportunity to pause, wait, and watch for the Christ child. The reflections are part of a larger initiative called AdventWord, a global community praying and walking together during this holy season. Hosted by Virginia Theological Seminary and in partnership with Forward Movement, AdventWord invites people to read and respond to each day’s word. In Waiting and Watching, the daily reflections include a response or action item and a prayer.

2022 Colorable Advent Calendar: Slow Down. Quiet. It’s Advent!
This 2022 calendar poster, with Illustrations by Jay Sidebotham, suggests ways to mark the days through the Advent season. The calendar offers ideas for prayer, helping others, and being thoughtful about the true meaning of Christmas. Take our advice to your hearts and to your walls: Slow down. Quiet. It’s Advent! Perfect for the whole congregation! Sold in shrink wrapped packs of 25, posters are 17” x 22”, folded to 8.5” x 11.”

Expectant: Advent Meditations
Expectant: Advent Meditations by Anne Kitch offers 30 short reflections for each day of Advent. Each meditation focuses on seeking and seeing God in the everyday of our ordinary lives, based on a psalm that corresponds to the daily office for the season of Advent.

Preparing Room: An Advent Companion
In Preparing Room: An Advent Companion, Russell J. Levenson, Jr turns to the beginning of the Christian story as it centers on the coming of God in Jesus through scripture, meditations, reflections or suggestions, and prayers.

Faithful Families for Advent and Christmas: 100 Ways to Make the Season Sacred
Faithful Families for Advent and Christmas by Traci Smith is the holiday companion to the bestselling Faithful Families: Creating Sacred Moments at Home. In it you’ll discover a treasure trove of inspiring Advent and Christmas practices, prayers, and stories to share with your family, or families in your church.

Imagining a New World: An Advent Devotional
In this new daily devotional for Advent, Imagining a New World: An Advent Devotional, author Terri Hord Owens delves into the Advent lectionary texts to reflect on God’s vision for the world and how we might find the courage to imagine, the permission to change, and the freedom to fear no more.

On the Way to Bethlehem: A Child’s Activity Book for Christmas
In On the Way to Bethlehem, children learn the amazing story of Jesus’ birth based on the Gospels of Luke and Matthew. As you travel the road to Bethlehem, these delightful illustrations and descriptive story introduce children to Mary and Joseph as real people who were living ordinary lives when God called them to be part of an extraordinary event—the birth of God’s Son. The book includes a maze and an Advent calendar with stickers. The perfect Christmas gift for all the children in your church!

Celebrate Wonder, Winter 2022-23
Support children’s faith formation at home with the Celebrate Wonder Winter Curriculum, designed to offer meaningful family engagement in the Bible stories of Mary’s and Joseph’s calling, Jesus’ birth, and Jesus’ ministry. For each of 13 stories, you’ll find a unique retelling of the Bible story, a faith word to explore, wonder questions, and suggestions for a family activity.

Advent and Christmas Resources from The Episcopal Church

Find a number of activities and curricula from Journeying the Way of Love to Preparing to Become Beloved Community on this page.

SALT's "Less is More" Christmas collection.

Lent begins with Ash Wednesday, forty-plus days before Easter Sunday. During Lent we recommit to Christian practices such as prayer, almsgiving, fasting, and reconciliation to prepare to enter the mystery of Easter. Through these practices, we deepen our commitment to the Christian life and prepare to renew their baptismal promises.

During Lent, the whole Church is invited to a “holy observance…by self-examination and repentance; by prayer, fasting, and self-denial; and by reading and meditating on God’s holy Word.” (The Book of Common Prayer, page 265)

We offer these resources to help you, your family, and your congregation to set aside this time of preparation and reflection.

Ash Wednesday Resources

• The Right Reverend Chilton R. Knudsen, Assisting Bishop, offers collected wisdom and guidelines for observing Ash Wednesday in a Pandemic
• The Rev. Shivaun Wilkinson, Associate Rector at St. John's, Olney, shares a creative Ash Wednesday Liturgy for Households with Children
• Bishop J. Neil Alexander shares a note on Ash Wednesday and the Imposition of Ashes in a Time of Pandemic
• The Diocese of Colorado has this Ash Wednesday bookmark that could be included in a Lent-at-Home box for the self imposition of ashes
• The website BuildFaith offers a suite of resources for observing Ash Wednesday for the entire congregation

Lenten Resources

Holy Week Resources

• Holy Week Resources for Families by Church Publishing
• Holy Week for Children from Building Faith provides interactive ideas for meaningful ways for all ages to enter the mystery of the Triduum (Maundy Thursday, Good Friday and the Easter Vigil)

Building Faith

Illustrated Ministries

• Acts in Easter from Christ Church, Houston (2020)
  • Reading Plan and Prayer Practices
  • Small Group Guide and Curriculum
  • Additional Resources

Coming soon!