Awakening the Desire for God, Part 2

In this article Sr Hyacinthe examines the ways in which Notre Dame de Vie’s catechesis provides for an encounter with God to take place. All catechesis can be thought of as a response to the fundamental human desire for God. ‘The desire for God is written in the human heart, because man is created by God and for God’[i]. God is the origin and finality of the human person. Catechesis should never be thought of as something imposed arbitrarily and somehow artificially on children and young people just because Christianity happens to be the religion in which they are brought up. Catechesis is rather there to answer a need which corresponds to a thirst, present in all human beings created for God. The first part of this article explored this desire for God and introduced the catechetical work of Notre Dame de Vie, a French programme and approach which I believe engages in a profound way with this desire. In this second part of the article I would like to examine how Notre Dame de Vie’s catechesis provides for this encounter with God to take place and recount some catechists’ experience in using the programme Viens, suis-moi, tracing its impact in the sacramental, moral and prayer life of the children, in these ecclesial expressions of the life of grace.