This 7 session study will explore how contemporary young adult Christians who are either living alone or in a family group may create or contribute to a supportive and nurturing "family" life.
Session titles include:
Defining Family--What is a family?
The Value of Family--Why should I care about family when I can make it on my own? Tensions between individuality and community, dependence or independence. Is family obsolete? What is the value of "family" for single people, friends, family life. What does it mean to be interdependent?
Family and Identity--What does "family" contribute to a person's identity? Do we create and/or inherit our identities?
Brokenness in the Family--What do "functional" and "dysfunctional" mean?
Characteristics of Healthy Families--What characteristics exist in healthy families who function in a variety of circumstances? Friendships? Two-income families? Long hours of employment? How does contemporary life work for or against family life?
Creating Healthy Families--How do families with children (traditional two-parent and single-parent) provide a supportive and nurturing family life for their children? How do couples without children build nurturing family life? How do single people build "family" that is nurturing and supportive? How do communities and institutions contribute to or detract from family life?
God's Family--What does it mean to look to "family" as an image of Contemporary Christian life? God as Parent? Mother? Father? Inclusivity? Multicultural? Family members who have passed on? Cloud of witnesses?
Author: James Hawkins Publisher: Abingdon Press Published: 03/01/2004 Pages: 78 Binding Type: Paperback Weight: 0.27lbs Size: 8.90h x 6.00w x 0.20d ISBN: 9780687027163
About the Author Hawkins, James: - James Hawkins is a pastor, currently serving in Smyrna, Delaware. A graduate of Northwestern University, Jim's first career was in journalism. After a short and exciting stint as a reporter for a daily newspaper in Southern California, he responded to God's calling him to pastoral ministry, a different kind of news business. He graduated from Wesley Theological Seminary and has served as a pastor in the Peninsula-Delaware Conference. In addition to his pastoral duties, Jim writes for FaithLink and is the author of Family: Finding Who We Are and How We Belong, a volume in the 20/30 Series for Young Adults. Jim is married to Kathleen, who is the executive director of The United Methodist Foundation in the Eastern Pennsylvania and Peninsula-Delaware conferences. In his free time, Jim loves music (particularly singing), cooking, eating Kathleen's much better cooking, and traveling.
