BACK TO SCHOOL WEEK: Key questions

Check in over at http://suchasthese.wordpress.com/ to see what others are saying about the spiritual formation of children …
A reader captures one important dimension of this subject here:

I’m reading “A New Kind of Christianity” for the second time — really “chewing” on it this time. You’ve helped me articulate things that have been formulating in my heart and mind for a while now… and, there’s a sense of relief: I’m not crazy! (Well, maybe a little.) My wife and I have had lots of good conversations lately, trying to work out the implications of all this. If there’s one word I could use to describe how we feel these days, it’s HOPEFUL. Thanks for all you’ve done to encourage/inspire.
We have two kids, ages 5 and 3, and we want to do a good job of laying a strong spiritual foundation. In the emergent context, do you have any suggestions on how to “raise them up in the way they should go”? How and what to pray for them? How to talk to them about Jesus? Answer questions they have about hell (especially when they hear about it from others)? Questions about sexuality? Sin? Heaven? Basically, do you have any thoughts on how to communicate everything you wrote about in ANKC to kids?
For some time, we’ve got the impression from our faith community that the MOST IMPORTANT thing to push our kids to “pray the prayer” and “get baptized”… But there’s so much more than that!

Two responses – first, these are exactly the kinds of questions we need to grapple with. Stay tuned for information about an international gathering about kids’ ministry and a new kind of Christianity … May 7-10, 2012, in Washington, DC.
Second, I hope many people will offer their responses over at Dave Csinos’ site – This is an important topic about which we all need to have a say.