These Are Our Bodies, High School Leader Guide: Talking Faith & Sexuality at Church & Home (High School Leader Guide)

By Samantha Haycock and Caren Miles

This Leader Guide contains nine sessions for engaging high school students, (ages 14-18 years) in conversation about faith and sexuality in the These Are Our Bodies program, helping participants and their adult parents or guardians deepen their connection between God, the Bible, and sexuality. Each session uses scripture as an integral piece of the program using the NRSV or Common English Bible translation. Facilitators and small group leaders will find detailed planning information as well as background and useful information to employ the program in your church or community in a variety of settings: youth group, Christian education, camps, or retreats. Comprised of two sections, “The Introduction” provides the goals of the curriculum, describes parts of each lesson, and provides all needed information for leaders to implement the program. The second section offers nine full session plans that have five parts that work together to create a hands-on, interactive approach to learning: Gather, Grow, Grapple, Guide, and Go. These offer creative and playful ways to engage with the material and participants in ways that provide intentional group formation, engage the nature of high schoolers, offer time to wrestle with new material, provide words of blessing and affirmation, and allow time to move from the sessions back into the world. The Facilitator leads each session with the help of Small-Group Leaders who facilitate the games, activities, and discussions.
SESSION 1: This is Our Introduction (John 15:16-17; Luke 2:41-52; Luke 19:45-48)
SESSION 2: This is Our Language (Proverbs 19:2; Ephesians 4:25-32)
SESSION 3: This is Our Value System (Philippians 4:8; Romans 7:14-25)
SESSION 4: This is Our Identity (Psalm 139:13-16; 1 Corinthians 12:12-27)
SESSION 5: This is Our Self Image (Genesis 1:26; Genesis 3:1-11)
SESSION 6: This is Our Relationship (Ephesians 4:25; 1 Corinthians 13)
SESSION 7: This is Our Health (Proverbs 2:10-11; Matthew 13:10-17)
SESSION 8: This is Our Dignity (Matthew 22:37-39; Luke 8:40-56)
SESSION 9: This is Our Theology (Isaiah 30:21; John 14:1-14)

• Language: English
• Publisher: Church Publishing
• Release date: Jun 1, 2017
• ISBN: 9781606743300

Samantha Haycock

Samantha Clare is the Episcopal lay chaplain to the University of Arkansas and coordinates young adult ministries with St. Paul's Episcopal Church in Fayetteville. She holds a BA in Psychology from the University of California, Santa Cruz and has a passion for spreading Jesus' call for social justice. Previously the Director of Children and Youth Ministry at Christ Church, Alameda, California, she has been involved in diocesan sponsored youth events over the past decade, including summer camps, Happening, and the triennial Episcopal Youth Event. She lives in West Fork, Arkansas.

Book preview

The only way I know how to teach anyone

to love God, and how I myself can love

God, is to love what God loves, which is

everything and everyone, including you and

including me!¹

—Richard Rohr

We love because [God] first loved us.

—1 John 4:19 NRSV

If we love each other, God remains in us and [God’s] love is made perfect in us.

—1 John 4:12 CEB

Welcome to These Are Our Bodies for High School Leader Guide.

As parents, leaders, or clergy, you recognize the imperative to teach and lead young people in connecting their faith life and their sexuality. The church has something to say to our young people, a message of empowerment and acceptance. The church is called to assist people to grow in their faith and lead the life to which they are called. Considering anew what God is calling us toward, fostering respect, wholeness, and love will lift up the body of Christ. Just as there are seasons to our faith (such as birth, baptism, and reaffirmation), there are seasons to our sexuality (birth, awareness, growth, change, and transformation). Sexuality: A Divine Gift explores the interplay of the physical experience, love, and gift:

The Episcopal Church is a sacramental church. Anglicans claim a union of physical experience and inward grace both in the sacraments of the church and in our daily lives.

The church increasingly understands that our sexuality is an important (though not the only) means by which we learn to be lovers. Our awareness of each other, our acceptance of our affection for each other as God’s creations, and our delight in the special gifts that each of us brings to a relationship because of our sexuality—all these are evidence of the blessings that God intends for us in our dealings with each other.²

With all this in mind, These Are Our Bodies offers practical information, developmental material, and suggestions on how to ask and answer questions, all in the context of our faith as Christians, particularly as Episcopalians. These Are our Bodies was created in response to the need of the Episcopal Church for program resources to help young people explore sexuality in the context of a faith community. The program consists of a Foundation Book and several age-level modules that each has a Leader Guide, a Participant Book, and a Parent Book.

These Are Our Bodies: Sexuality & Faith at Church & Home offers the Foundation Book for the entire These Are Our Bodies program and is an integral part of the High School program module. Facilitators, parents, and caretakers are all encouraged to have a copy of the Foundation Book. In addition to this High School module, a Middle School module was published in August 2016. A Preschool and Elementary module (ages 3–11) and a Young Adult module (ages 18–30) will be available in the fall of 2017.

The These Are Our Bodies Foundation Book serves as a theological and practical guide to conversation about the complexities of sexuality in today’s world grounded in the Episcopal faith tradition. The book includes essays around the role of sexuality and practical guides to help inform church educators, clergy, parents, youth leaders, or anyone who seeks to broaden their knowledge on this subject. It is organized into four sections, The Theological, The Ethical, The Biological, and The Practical, each exploring the complexity of sexuality. The Foundation Book is written both to be read on its own and as part of the unified These Are Our Bodies program. The extensive annotated resource section and glossary round out the book to give readers the information they need for further exploration in areas around sexuality.

The theological chapters in Section I explore the dynamic of sexuality and its connection to our faith. This section concludes with a discussion of the role of the church in the area of sexuality and will be helpful to facilitators of the High School program.

Section II, The Ethical, gives us a new language necessary to expand our view of sexuality. The binary concepts of sexuality as male or female, married or single, heterosexual or homosexual are expanding. Readers will receive a new way to understand sexuality, including new language that seeks to honor and respect the dignity of all people. An understanding of the Ethical chapters will inform facilitators as they work with participants of the High School program.

In Section III, The Biological, we expand on the role of parenting in healthy development and provide a review of developmental theories, moral development psychology, and faith development across the life span. The research and theories of leading psychologists underpins our understanding of the needs of children, including the healthy growth of their bodies and their moral development. We conclude this section with a discussion of faith development and its implications around understanding the complexity of human sexuality, which is especially helpful to facilitators in the High School program.

Section IV, The Practical, gives adults the tools needed to understand the stages of child development that inform our ministry with children and teens. The review of development (physical, emotional and social, spiritual, and moral) will benefit anyone working with or raising children and teens.

The annotated resource section and glossary are rich with valuable insights and materials. For facilitators of the High School program, the Foundation Book will be a resource linking faith and sexuality.

As a church, we want to empower parents to be the primary sexuality educators of their children, walking with them on the journey and providing resources to assist them in having important and timely conversations. These Are Our Bodies: High School Program answers that request and this Leader Guide contains the background and sessions needed to plan and implement the program. The sessions in These Are Our Bodies program materials (age-based Leader Guide, Parent Book, and Participant Book) are each designed to teach concepts around our faith in ways that connect with teenagers and give them opportunities to strengthen their faith and understanding of sexuality. The curriculum includes content that makes a connection between our faith and sexuality, the modeling of facilitator interaction, how questions can be answered, and how to create a safe, learning atmosphere.

These Are Our Bodies for High School is a comprehensive faith and sexuality program that can be used in an array of settings and is adaptable to meet the needs of a variety of groups. Based on the universal needs of young people and their parents, it honors and lifts up parents as the primary sexuality educators to their children by involving parents as an integral part of the experience. There is a parent and participant session (Session 1) to empower parents and teens to have meaningful conversations around sexuality and faith as they both begin the program, setting the stage for ongoing engagement in the sessions to follow that are geared just for the teens.

This Leader Guide contains nine sessions that are developmentally appropriate, creatively interactive, and faith-based. They place human sexuality in the context of faith. Direct and indirect teaching around concepts such as God’s creation, scripture, and sexuality as gift from God are intertwined throughout the sessions. Conversations and teaching around the stewardship of gifts, responsible behavior, and God’s grace and love are found throughout the sessions. Facilitators will find detailed planning information as well as the background and useful information to employ the program in your church or community.

Our hope is that this program will be a gift to you and the young people with whom you work, that it will spark conversation, enable connections to our faith, and empower leaders, parents, and high schoolers to live the life to which they are called—embracing love, acceptance, and compassion for all.

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1Richard Rohr Franciscan Mysticism: I AM That Which I Am Seeking (Albuquerque, NM: Center for Action and Contemplation: 2012), disc 2; assessed https://cac.org/love-god-in-what-is-right-in-front-of-you-2016-01-17/, January 23, 2016.

2Education for Mission & Ministry Unit. Sexuality: A Divine Gift (New York: Domestic and Foreign Missionary Society, 1987), 4.

Welcome to These Are Our Bodies!

These Are Our Bodies is a comprehensive faith and sexuality program for high schoolers that can be used in a variety of settings, including Sunday morning classes, evening events, or retreats. The program is based on the universal needs of teenagers and the adults who care for them. As the primary sexuality educators to their children, parents and adult caretakers are an integral part of the program.

The program is a developmentally appropriate and a faith-based approach to sexuality that invites you to explore human sexuality in the context of faith. Concepts such as God’s creation, covenant, sexuality as gift from God, identity, and relationships are at the core of each session, framed and informed with Scripture. Conversations and hands-on activities engage teens in deepening their understanding of self, their behavior and language, and God’s grace and love for them.

Young people in middle adolescence (ages 15–18) and late adolescence (ages 17–19) are gaining a better sense of self and their identity. This includes their sexual identity, behaviors, peer relationships, and emotions. As with all adolescents, those of high school age need reassurance from parents, teachers, and mentors that their growth and development is normal. At this time in their life they are looking beyond home and family towards independence, college or a career, possibly long-term relationships, and so much more. While growing into a firmer identity apart from their family, the role of family and a faith community continue to be important, if not more so during these years. They continue to need trusted people who can be a sounding board for their ideas, interests, and problems. Adults and mentors have an important role in helping older adolescents solidify a moral code of personal behavior and healthy life practices. That is what this program is about in addition to discussing how sexuality is a gift from God.

High schoolers inhabit a challenging season of life where their bodies are almost fully formed: they look like adults, and are often treated as such, although they don’t have the decision-making skills or brain power to react in an adult manner. These years of personality development usually involve separating themselves from their parents by trying on different ideologies, fashions, and decision-making styles. As youths move away from their families as their primary support system, church youth groups can provide a stable, loving group of peers in which to test their independence. The sessions in These Are Our Bodies for High School explore all the aspects of growing into responsible, respectful, Christian adults while giving teens skills to survive many aspects of high school. In conversations about real-world dilemmas, discussions of Scripture, and times of prayer together, the group can safely discern the intersection of their sexuality and spirituality. Leaders model relationship skills such as listening, empathy, and problem solving as together they explore topics and answer questions in an open and healthy atmosphere.

These Are Our Bodies teaches that we are all God’s children—loved and redeemed. Each of us is made in the image of God—good and holy. There is nothing that we can do to separate us from the love of God. Forgiveness and grace are gifts given to each of us and are born from God’s love for us. Human beings are made in the image of God—perfectly made, but not perfect. Human beings are imperfect. We are best when we are open, vulnerable, and truthful with each other. These messages are embedded in the way that facilitators answer questions and interact with the teenagers.

You might notice that we use our for the main pronoun throughout this program. Although teenagers are building their own autonomy, individuality, and independence, when it comes to unpacking the issues we struggle with it is comforting to know that we are not alone. As a community that supports each other, challenges each other, and loves each other, we share so much in common. Helping teens learn to feel and receive empathy will guide them to become adult Christians who have healthy relationships and solid self-esteem.

Your high schoolers may have already participated in the Middle School program module of These Are Our Bodies. Those sessions focused on the individual, more egocentric young person developmentally; this is seen in terms of my body in topics such as "You are God’s Creation and You are Complex. Older adolescents are now looking outward toward the world and are more mindful of the community that surrounds them that they are part of. That’s another reason the sessions for High School are phrased in terms beyond the self, such as Our Language System and Our Identity." Within these sessions there is an assumption that high school students (for the most part) are nearly through or have completed puberty. While growth spurts in boys may continue during these years, they are beginning to be more comfortable with their bodies and the changes they have physically undergone in recent years. Their focus is now on building stronger relationships and bonds with others, experimentation around identity, relationships, and sexuality, and what the future may hold upon completion of high school. Their explorations are about where they fit in the greater world as an emerging adult, including their sexuality.

All of this is grounded in our faith. These Are Our Bodies recognizes that we are all God’s children—loved and redeemed. We are each made in the image of God and are thus good and holy. As a faith community, we are called to reclaim this core belief and confirm our understanding that we honor God when we honor the sacredness of our own bodies as well as respecting and honoring the dignity of others’ bodies. Sexuality is part of being human and our sexuality is part of our spiritual selves. The body is more than sex, more than sexuality. It is our hope that These Are Our Bodies for High School offers a space for exploring how honoring the body is a shared practice. Young people need guidance and support from their family, friends, and communities to openly affirm and articulate that sexuality is good and part of a holistic understanding of who we are as children of God.

Components of These Are Our Bodies

Four companion resources make up These Are Our Bodies for High School:

the Foundation Book (recommended for each facilitator and caregiver)

the High School Leader