Tag Archives: study

John Pridmore Wrestles with the Angel of Childhood

A Book Review by Jeannie Babb

Playing with Icons: The Spirituality of Recalled Childhood
By John Pridmore
with foreward by Jerome Berryman

197 pp. The Center for the Theology of Childhood. $24.95

cover detail from Playing with IconsJohn Pridmore’s thorough and insightful book will capture the imagination of those who nurture children, especially in religious settings. Playing with Icons offers more an analysis of beautifully written case studies than a scientific survey. Pridmore, a retired Anglican priest, based his study on published autobiographies of childhood. He lists over a hundred such works in the bibliography, weaving evocative passages throughout the body of the book.

Pridmore invites the reader on an existential journey to play with and welcome the child. He likens children to icons, which when painted on wood gaze past us to behold God, even as we gaze at them and beyond them to God. Like an icon, a child’s vision of the divine lends us our own sighting. Pridmore invites us not only to pray with these icons, but to play with them and recognize this playfulness as a sort of prayer. Continue reading

Godly Play as Spiritual Intervention presented at International Conference for Children’s Spirituality

Doug Watts and Ryan Campbell recently presented a workshop at the 15th INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON CHILDREN’S SPIRITUALITY, convened by the International Association for Children’s Spirituality, at Bishop Grosseteste University in Lincoln, UK.

15th International Conference on  Children's Spirituality Workshop Leaders

15th International Conference on Children’s Spirituality Workshop Leaders

The theme of this year’s conference, SPIRITUALITY AND THE WHOLE CHILD: INTERDISCIPLINARY APPROACHES, matches closely the focus of the work Watts and Campbell do at Children’s Medical Center – Dallas.  Continue reading

Jerome Berryman Rabbi Michael Shire

Become a Visiting Fellow of the Center for the Theology of Childhood

Jerome Berryman Rabbi Michael Shire

Jerome Berryman with Rabbi Michael Shire

As the academic and publishing arm of the Godly Play Foundation, the Center for the Theology of Childhood functions as a research center. It houses a library of over 4,000 books related to Godly Play. Some of the topics includes classical theology, mystical theology, philosophy (especially the existentialists), ethics, child development, Montessori, play, silence, laughter, tears, religious education, and the history of childhood. The archive houses a collection of Jerome Berryman’s publications and important historical documents related to Godly Play and the Foundation. The Center also includes a well-equipped Godly Play room nearby, hosted by St. Gabriel’s Episcopal Church in South Denver. Children of the parish gather there each Sunday. Continue reading