Confirmation with a twist

Lutheran, The, Apr 2002 by Elliott, Bob

Few limits on what is asked at annual quiz bowl

If you had to think up questions for an eighth-grade confirmation class, chances are you wouldn't ask: What is the guarantee on a package of condoms?

That's because you haven't attended confirmation class at Bethlehem Lutheran Church, St. Charles, Ill. There, young people learn more than Martin Luther's Small Catechism, the Ten Commandments and the Lord's Prayer. They learn practical lessons in living the Christian life today.

Church leaders believe youth rushing headlong into puberty need to know there is no guarantee on a condom package. And the question is very likely to pop up at the Ten Commandments Bowl.

Quizzing from hot sides

Halfway through each year of Bethlehem's two-year confirmation cycle, students take a public test in a TV quiz-show format. With a twist.

After confirmands are examined in front of and by the congregation, they get to ask the audience questions. The Ten Commandments Bowl alternates each year with a more general catechism quiz bowl.

Jane Kunzie-Brunner, a pastor of Bethlehem, is the quizmaster and referee; two Sunday school teachers are judges. In the first round of the Ten Commandments Bowl, Kunzie-- Brunner puts the confirmands through

their paces. They recite the commandments and the explanation of each from The Small Catechism.

But it's more than a recitation. They use American Sign Language as they speak.

This year the bowl fell on the day Congress issued a subpoena to the former chair of Enron Corp. The scandal came up in the first round of public questioning: Which commandments did the leaders of Enron break? There was nearly unanimous agreement that seven was broken"You shall not steal"-and probably eight and nine as well.

"At the very least," said one young confirmand, "I think they betrayed the trust of their employees and the public."

The audience at this year's event filled the education hall, and there will likely be an overflow crowd at the confirmation service on Reformation Sunday.

Cool Wednesdays

Kunzie-Brunner, who teaches most of the Wednesday evening confirmation classes, says the 2001-02 course involves 70 students in 12 small groups with 20 youth mentors. "And we have a waiting list of people who want to pop be mentors to these kids," she adds.

As a teacher, she brings to the confirmation process an infectious passion for ministry and young people. "It's our job to make faith and the commandments practical and relevant to the world young people live in. The temptations are out there-- sex and drugs, you name it;" she says. "Young people need to learn that God has an answer and a plan for them. And there's no reason why the learning shouldn't be fun."

Fun, it clearly is. Kunzie-Brunner's classes frequently erupt in laughter. Students seem to enjoy the signing, even describing it as "cool." It appears to help their learning, retention and understanding of the catechism.

Much of the program's organizing and logistics falls to Anne Lee, an associate in ministry and Bethlehem's director of Christian education. She organizes the small groups that meet following the large group. Lee describes the groups as a car full of kids-five or six-and one or two adult faith mentors. They gather in Sunday school classrooms and meeting rooms throughout the church.

"The young people meet to discuss the week's lessons and ask questions of their faith mentors and their peers," Lee says.

Several graduates of the classes describe the small groups as something more. Jake Martens, 16, was confirmed two years ago and still values his small-group experience. He describes it in terms usually reserved for support groups: "We were able to talk about our fears and our faults openly. What was said there stayed there. It was a great experience. You can't get something like that anywhere else."

In the summer before high school, each candidate for confirmation writes an essay: "Why I want to be confirmed in the Christian faith." They are asked to describe the life of faith and how they hope to use their spiritual gifts. Martens wrote: "It can be hard sometimes to forgive people for what they have done, but if God and Jesus can, then I can, too, with the help of the Holy Spirit."

Reflecting on her confirmation class, Kristen Fisher, 15, says, "I loved it. Especially all the relationships I developed that helped me strengthen my faith." In her essay, Fisher said she wanted to be confirmed, among other reasons, because she wanted to come back to confirmation camp as a leader.

Today she teaches 4-year-olds in Sunday school and plays in Bethlehem's hand bell choir.

Elliott is a free-lance writer living in Chicago.

For more information Bethlehem Lutheran Church in St. Charles, Ill., uses material from Faith Inkubators (www.faithink.com, 888-- 55-FAITH), a church renewal program in Stillwater, Minn.