As part of its Empowering Families for Spiritual Formation grant, Campbell University Divinity School hosted its first retreat for families and churches to explore and experience new spiritual practices and discover learning opportunities based on their wants and needs.
The retreat was held March 28-30 at Camp Caraway, located outside of Asheboro, and included Divinity School students, nine partner churches and 30 families.
Campbell was awarded the Empowering Families for Spiritual Formation grant in 2023 through the Lilly Endowment focusing on Christian parenting and caregiving. In January 2024, the Rev. Dr. Sarah Boberg began her work as assistant professor of Christian education and director of Empowering Families for Spiritual Formation. That summer, Azizi Culpepper was hired as the administrative assistant and in the fall, Taylor Long, a Divinity school student, was hired as the graduate research assistant, completing the Empowering Families team.
The Empowering Families team traveled to nine partner churches around the state last fall to host “listening sessions” to hear what families and churches need to nurture regular, substantive, holistic, family-centered spiritual formation. Following these listening sessions, the team reviewed the research to find major themes to inform the next steps, including the planning of a family retreat.
The purpose of the retreats is for families and churches to explore and experience spiritual practices and learning opportunities based on their wants and needs. Another goal is to continue to gather information for the purpose of creating and gathering future resources for families and churches. The first of these retreats was hosted in late March.
Retreat activities included children’s sessions, parent sessions, combined family worship experiences, family prayer stations, guided family play and family free time. Parent sessions included:
- The Intentionality of Time, led by Dr. Sarah Boberg
- Engaging Scripture, led by Dr. Jennifer Bashaw, associate professor of New Testament and Christian Ministry
- Talking Theology, led by Dr. Ryan Newson, associate professor of Theology and Ethics
- Mental Health, led by Melissa Reed, licensed clinical mental health counselor associate and graduate of Campbell University Divinity School
The retreat was a culmination of over a year of work prayer, preparation and collaboration. It was a beautiful representation of faithful churches and individuals devoted to nurturing the spiritual formation of children and families. Highlights of the weekend included worship and family free time, according to Boberg.
Worship services were created intentionally for families with children. Services were planned to not exceed 30 minutes total. They included interactive prayers and music. Worship tools were also provided for children to engage in different ways. These tools included writing tablets, fabric marble mazes, and worship scarves. One of the most powerful images from the weekend was children filling the aisles of the worship space waving scarves. Caregivers and children expressed their excitement for worship planned with their needs in mind.
At the end of the retreat, one of the research questions included asking children to place an orange ping-pong ball in a bucket to show what they enjoyed the most about the weekend. The choices included: worship & celebrations, children’s Activities, family play experience, family prayer stations, and free time with family. An overwhelming number of children placed their ping-pong ball in the bucket labeled “free time with family.” This is just one research finding, but a very impactful one.
“Christian families are busy, often missing out on opportunities to be intentional about their time together,” Boberg said. “It was clear these families enjoyed spending time learning, growing, worshiping and playing together.”
As the Empowering Families team begins the next phase of the grant work, it will work to gather and create resources to help families nurture spiritual formation with a focus of making the most of their time together.
The Empowering Families team will also host a Family Fun Day in fall 2025 to invite participating families and local families to family worship, a shared meal and a football game. And in spring 2026, the team will host the second family retreat to share with the participating churches and families the resources they have gathered and created for continued exploration and feedback.