200 years of Sunday School

For broadcast on 2CH Sydney, 9 June 2013.

One of the best ways to learn about God and God’s ways is to hear Bible stories retold – and there’s no better opportunity for that than as children.

Two hundred years ago this month, Mr Thomas Hassall began Australia’s first Sunday School in the house of his father on the corner of George and Charles Streets, Parramatta, and later relocated to St John’s Church where a service of thanksgiving was held last Sunday.

Senior Minister, the Reverend Canon Bruce Morrison, said “There is nothing more important to any church, or any society for that matter, than the next generation, the children who will one day be the mothers and fathers, the workers and the leaders, the teachers and the carers.”

He’s right.  Stories learned in childhood, carrying moral and spiritual truths, stay with us into adulthood and on into old age, doing their quiet work, showing what is good, conveying timeless wisdom.

I’m Rod Benson for the NSW Council of Churches.