Progressive Sunday School Curriculum

Like all of our ministry, family ministry at the Abbey is rooted in a progressive Christian tradition. This means using many different pronouns for God, not just masculine ones. It means avoiding the language of blame and sin and focusing on how the life and ministry of Jesus can serve as a guide for our spiritual lives. It means recognizing children as future community leaders by cultivating autonomy and responsibility in ministry programming. Most importantly, it means supporting children’s wellbeing throughout their lives by emphasizing social emotional awareness, social justice, and community connection.

Sharing the stories of our faith and supporting children’s spiritual formation is important work. We are familiar with the struggle to find accessible and genuinely progressive curriculum for our youth and families. Believe me, we have tried it all! Here you can find a full year’s worth of free, truly progressive curriculum for the youngest learners and leaders in your congregation. 

Each unit has four lessons around a specific theme and each lesson contains a children’s bible story, a picture book mentor text, and a craft. The units and the individual lessons within can be adapted and done in any order. They were designed for and implemented in our 30-minute, one-room Sunday school and we encourage you to adapt them to meet the needs of your group and your space. You can order the books we use for each unit through our website! Thank you for joining us in the work of making space for all young people to feel seen, heard, and connected with one another.

This curriculum and the youth worship guides were written and designed by Isa Manhart.

Children’s and Family Bibles

Finding a good children's bible can be tricky! At the Abbey, we used two illustrated bibles — Growing in God’s Love, edited by Elizabeth F. Caldwell A. Wehrheim, and The Peace Table from Shine Curriculum. These beautifully illustrated Bibles contain stories, activities, and space for inquiry great for families and Sunday School classrooms. Both books are featured in our free downloadable Sunday School curriculum.

Unit One: What is An Abbey?

Rationale: This unit is designed to help youth get acquainted with the principles of hospitality, generosity, and connection, as well as the work of social justice in our United Methodist tradition. 

Objective: Students will be able to describe how an Abbey/church community can promote hospitality, generosity, connection, and social justice.

Unit Three: Caring for God’s Creation

Rationale: This unit is designed in alignment with the Lent season to help students explore Lent and springtime as a time for appreciating and protecting our natural world. These lessons explore creation, different conceptions of the Earth as sacred, growth, and environmental equity.

Objective: Students will be able to describe how they can appreciate and advocate for God’s creation—our planet Earth!

Unit Two: The Nature of God

Rationale: This unit is designed to help students understand the expansive nature of God, beyond traditional masculine conceptions, as well as the ways they might feel God’s presence, and be part of God’s love. Students are invited to explore different ways of imagining and experiencing God—there is no one correct way to be in connection with God.

Objective: Students will understand that people can imagine and experience God in different ways. Students will be able to describe and practice different ways to live in and through God’s love.

Youth Worship Guides

At Urban Abbey, we prioritize intergenerational faith experiences by keeping families seated together during services rather than pulling children away for a separate Sunday School time. We believe that families celebrating worship together is important for spiritual growth and formation in community.

We designed our Youth Worship Guides to aid in this experience. When adults enter we hand them a bulletin to follow along in worship, and we do the same for children and youth. Our Youth Worship Guides provide interactive coloring activities, writing prompts, and games that align with the spiritual and social justice focus of our services, making worship engaging and accessible for young people.

Below you can download free copies of some of our favorite Youth Worship Guides to use in your own services or Sunday School.