St. Philip’s in Payson Parish’s bible school a success

St, Philip the Apostle Parish in Payson experimented with a Fall Break Bible School for the children who to go on vacation with their parents. It was a resounding success.
Twenty-eight students ages 5 to 12 attended from Oct. 10 to 14 with a special session on Oct. 15 to correspond with the Diocesan celebration of the Holy Rosary.
The children studied three parables: The Good Samaritan (love and care for those in need), The Prodigal Son (God the Father’s endless mercy to His lost sheep), and the Ten lepers (how few remember to thank God).
The special study of the rosary prayers gave the students great opportunities to exercise their artistic skills. Every day the children went out on the roped-off parking lot to draw with sidewalk chalk another decade of their huge rosary.
By Saturday, when parishioners were reciting the rosary in the church and at St. Philip’s Fatima Shrine, the children and parents were walking from one bead to another with parents and grandparents reciting the prayers they’d just practiced all week.
The little ones were especially happy because as each child said one prayer, they were allowed to pick up the silk rose on that bead to give to Mom or Dad. Ten red or white roses marked each decade of Hail Marys with rare pink roses placed on each Our Father bead.
An unexpected event on a nature walk inadvertently taught the students about answered prayers:
One child spotted a Praying Mantis motionless on a tree limb. As a teacher joked that the mantis probably was praying for a meal, the insect suddenly snatched a large carpenter ant and began to dine! The teacher tried to take the children away from the somewhat gruesome scene and asked who would like to leave. All said, “No thank you!”