Wish I could be there. I just received the copy of the book and wanted to thank you for your courageous stand for Reformed orthodoxy in an age when our historical roots have been taken for granted or outright ignored. The book is one of a kind. Keep up the good work brother.
I got an historical question about catechising (you’re going to tell me it’s answered in RRC, I bet 😉 ). Do you know how the practice looked historically: particularly, what age churches started to catechise their kids, and how much the kids understood as they learnt it?
I ask because it seems to me that some of the concepts and terms in Heidelberg and Westminster might even be beyond not a few adults, and I’m uncertain as to how much that can attributed to a decline in theological education, and how much to an improvement in communication skills.
Historically, children have begun memorizing the catechism very early. If the old “parrot, pert, poet” model holds, and I believe that it does — see the essay linked, then children are happy to learn what they don’t understand. When it’s time it has to be explained patiently and prayerfully.
So far as I know, that was the praxis of the church prior to modernity. It was certainly the old Reformed practice to require children to memorize the catechism prior to admission to the table.
My young children learned the catechism slowly. Long answer were broken up over several Sundays. See the essay linked for a start.
Wish I could be there. I just received the copy of the book and wanted to thank you for your courageous stand for Reformed orthodoxy in an age when our historical roots have been taken for granted or outright ignored. The book is one of a kind. Keep up the good work brother.
I got an historical question about catechising (you’re going to tell me it’s answered in RRC, I bet 😉 ). Do you know how the practice looked historically: particularly, what age churches started to catechise their kids, and how much the kids understood as they learnt it?
I ask because it seems to me that some of the concepts and terms in Heidelberg and Westminster might even be beyond not a few adults, and I’m uncertain as to how much that can attributed to a decline in theological education, and how much to an improvement in communication skills.
Hi Phil,
yes, I do discuss this a bit in RRC but I’ve also discussed it here.
Historically, children have begun memorizing the catechism very early. If the old “parrot, pert, poet” model holds, and I believe that it does — see the essay linked, then children are happy to learn what they don’t understand. When it’s time it has to be explained patiently and prayerfully.
So far as I know, that was the praxis of the church prior to modernity. It was certainly the old Reformed practice to require children to memorize the catechism prior to admission to the table.
My young children learned the catechism slowly. Long answer were broken up over several Sundays. See the essay linked for a start.
Great, thanks.