Lesson 9 : Compassion – think of the other person first…

…how can we show compassion? And why do we need to? We used the Virtues Guide for reference to discuss what compassion is, and how we can practice it: looking after a family member who is sick, feeding someone who is hungry, helping a friend who is stuck with his homework, caring for a pet, etc. The children had quite a few ideas!

As an example, we looked at and read the story of Lua Getsinger, who is wanting to help ‘Abdul’-Bahá in ‘Akká. He sends her off to look after a sick man, but she is so revolted by the state he is and lives in, that she runs back to the Master. He becomes quite sad and tells her, that if she wants to serve God, she must serve this man – if he is sick, she must tend him, if his house is dirty, she must clean it … which she then goes back to do, exactly as ‘Abdu’l-Bahá asked her.

We thought that this story showed us quite well, that we not only need to think of other people and show them compassion, but actually think of them BEFORE ourselves (of course, that’s not always easy :)!) The memorisation was a breeze again – these children are amazing!!

“Blessed is he who preferreth his brother before himself.” –Bahá’u’lláh

As a cute reminder of compassion – we made a series of animal finger puppets – find a template with some of the animal shapes here. The children had much fun colouring, naming and cutting out the little shapes and play little improvisation skits with their animal pets…

That was it for today – please note: there is no class next Sunday (29th of May), but we’re back  on the 5th of June (Queens Birthday weekend). Have a lovely couple of weeks!

Lesson 24 : Prefer your brother/sister (compassion)

This lesson is set around the theme of the ‘Golden Rule‘. In the Bahá’í teachings this is taken a little bit further to actually preferring others before oneself. Showing compassion to everyone around us – people, animals and our planet as well.

Last time we looked at this theme (see lesson 9) we created a whole lot of ‘whishes’ for others, to hang in our wishing tree. This time, we discussed what compassion towards animals would look like. Whether it’s feeding the cat, petting the dog, or helping a bird that has a broken wing – there are so many ways to be compassionate!

We created a series of paper-stick animals to remind us of being kind to animals and showing them our compassion.

The drawing, colouring in and cutting out happened with much concentration!

The children were quick with remembering the quote for this lesson (see quote of today, right hand side) – it’s so encouraging to see how easily they memorise them!

Our story for today, was one about Lua Getsinger, visiting ‘Abdu’l-Bahá in ‘Akká. See lesson 5 (Service) for details of it.

Finishing off our lesson today, we sang the song ‘I am Thirsty’ from Ruhi Book 3 – find a lovely recording of it on this wiki site. And lyrics are ready for download here (pdf).

And now off to feed some birds – it’s a glorious day outside… We’ve got 2 more classes before the big summer break – don’t miss out, we’re thinking of having a bit of special morning for the last one 🙂