Gospel at Home is the name of an informal meeting held at home with the purpose of reflecting on the moral aspects of the Gospel According to Spiritism (or another Evangelical book). It is done weekly on the same day, at the same time, punctually, and lasts approximately 30 minutes. It can go longer depending on the meeting’s format and the decision of its participants.
We believe that by gathering family members to read the Gospel According to Spiritism and praying together, families create appropriate vibration in the domestic environment to attract good spirits and receive their kind assistance. We believe that when we pray as a family, we make a stronger connection with God, and that positive energy brings the family members peace and balance, enabling them to vibrate and donate good energies to others in need.
Although there are no rigid rules on how to conduct the Gospel at Home meeting, in general people follow these steps with some slight variations:
1- Read a quick message from a Spiritist message book in preparation for the meeting (Eg. Happy Life by Joanna de Angelis, Our Daily Bread by Emmanuel).
2- Conduct the initial prayer (mentally connect with God, ask for the assistance of good spirits, vibrations of peace and love for the home environment, good intuitions, protection of the family, and positive energies to the ones who suffer.)
3- Read a succinct part of the Gospel According to Spiritism by Allan Kardec (some people pick a passage randomly while others read it in a sequenced way).
4- Invite participants to share their thoughts about the passage read, and reflect on how that lesson can be experienced in real life. When reflecting on the text, the moral aspects of the reading should be emphasized.
5- Conduct the final prayer. Use this moment to say a longer prayer full of good feelings such as love, peace, gratitude. and compassion; and thus, send positive vibrations to known and unknown people/spirits who might need good energies to relieve any physical, mental, emotional, or spiritual unbalance.
6. Magnetized water. At the beginning of the meeting, some people put on the table a water bottle to be magnetized to capture all good energies emanated during the prayers and good thoughts that were sent to the environment by the participants. At the end of the meeting, the participants drink some of that water as a way of receiving even more good energy from the meeting.
Gospel at Home: Meaningful, Mindful, and a Moral-Spiritual – Reflective Moment
When doing the Gospel at Home with the youth, it is important to show the children that the Gospel at Home is a special moment for the family, and it is everybody’s responsibility. Being punctual and consistent weekly, asking for everyone’s attendance, and explaining that it is a family’s responsibility are good ways of demonstrating that the Gospel at Home is an important commitment.
Regarding its importance, we summarize the Gospel at Home as a meaningful, mindful, and a moral-spiritual reflective moment for the family.
The Gospel at Home is a meaningful moment because it has a particular purpose, and its relevance should be shared with the youth. It is a moment with the special purpose of harmonizing the home and bringing everyone together to reflect on the lessons of Jesus Christ from a spiritual perspective. Also it is time for meaningful conversations with the youth: that really connects the family!
The Gospel at Home is a mindful moment because everyone should be connected to the present by listening to the week’s lesson and reflecting on how that can be applied to real life situations. It is a quick meeting, so the children should be constantly reminded that attending the Gospel at Home is not just “being there”. All participants should be mentally, emotionally, and spiritually connected to the meeting in order to be fully open to receive good energies from the good spirits and also to donate positive vibrations to the environment and other people/spirits.
Since the Gospel at Home is a moral-spiritual reflective moment, helping children understand the main moral lesson of the meeting from a spiritual point of view is a good way of initiating great conversations and awakening their curiosity!
Ideas for Gospel at Home with the youth
Creative ideas for the Gospel at Home!
By reflecting on the Gospel topics as immortal spiritual beings, children and teens will start perceiving life from a completely different perspective, and that will give them a solid foundation to overcome difficult situations, accept hard moments in the future and simply appreciate what they have in life.
One challenge about doing the Gospel at Home with the youth is that they might find difficult the Gospel’s vocabulary .
Here are some suggestions for parents to adapt the Gospel at Home and make it more engaging for the youth:
1- Retell parts of the Gospel by using a simplified vocabulary for the children.
2- share real life situations/examples from the children’s experiences that is connected with the theme of the meeting.
3- read Jesus’ stories for kids
4- ready stories with a moral lesson or a relevant spiritual content. There are many stories and videos with great moral lessons. After reading the story/playing the video, ask the kids to reflect about it by drawing a picture, coming up with alternative solutions for the story, sharing a personal experience related to the story, or writing a paragraph about the lesson learned. The kids’ reflections (arts, drawings, writings) can be presented by the end of the meeting. They love expressing themselves during the meeting so make that moment a special moment in family!
5- Alternatively, conduct a separate Gospel at Home meeting for the kids, so you find more flexibility to differentiate the meeting by using children’s books only.
6- Ask the kids to have a special notebook to write down their observations regarding the topic presented that week. The notebook might be entitled “Notes by my soul”, “The Gospel and me”, “Gospel at Home – my notes”, “My reflections”, etc.
7- Encourage kids to participate in the meeting by conducting the initial/final prayer, reading a small passage of the book, making comments of the story read, sharing personal experiences, etc.
8- What is the MAIN MESSAGE of today’s meeting? Create a small poster or a notebook to keep recording every week’s main message, so the family can keep revisiting the ideas weeks later in other Gospel at Home meetings.
Creative ideas for Gospel at Home for Kids – Click here!
If you have any questions on how to do the Gospel at Home or would like to share other ideas, please feel free to contact us!
Peace,
Nosso Lar Kids Team – nossolarkidsusa@gmail.com
Nosso Lar Kids 