WellSprings’ YouthSpirit Program is where our children grow spiritually and make friends while safely engaged in meaningful discussions and activities designed to encourage early practices of faith and spiritual consciousness. Our hope and mission is to give our families “more of life” (to glean a phrase from Robert Fulghum) and open the dialogue between parent and child about God, nature, acceptance, gratitude, forgiveness, love, and every meaning in life that our youngsters can imagine and experience.

The YouthSpirit program year progresses by season and offers active fall, winter, and spring classes, and a relaxed summer season when our children can enjoy a lightly structured fellowship time. Deeply rooted in WellSprings’ Core Values and Beliefs, and modeled after Springboards—our adult groups for spiritual growth—YouthSpirit meets in five age-appropriate Sunday morning classes including Nursery and Pre-Kindergarten, Kindergarten through First Grade, Second through Third Grade, Fourth through Fifth Grade, and Sixth through Twelfth Grade from September to May.

In September YouthSpirit launched the program year and engaged its fall season, “Beloved Community,” and the children explored belonging and their place in community through family, friends, school, our natural environment, and WellSprings. In December our season transitions to “Sharing Our Gifts,” when YouthSpirit takes action and reaches out to other communities while exploring how this action makes a difference both within and outside of ourselves. Program-wide, YouthSpirit partakes in Pennies for Peace to support our program theme this winter, and the children collect pennies to help build educational opportunities for children in underdeveloped areas of the world.

In spring, the third season of the program, classes become more introspective. YouthSpirit engages in “Listening to Our Lives” and examines objectives modeled after our adult Springboard of the same name which is structured around the central questions and purposes of the spiritual life.

Every Sunday the nursery is open to families with very young children at 9:00 and 11:00 AM for the entirety of each service. At the half-hour, the 3- and 4-year-olds participate in a lightly structured lesson that includes a short meditation, sharing time, and a story. Magda Rooney leads the nursery with a parent volunteer assisting each week.

As a community, our collective spiritual gifts are abundant, and our program provides opportunity for adult mentors to bring their heart’s passion to our youth. If you are interested in serving as a mentor in the near or even distant future, or would like to learn more about YouthSpirit, please contact Becky McAndrews, YouthSpirit Director, at becky@wellspringsuu.org.