Our philosophy with young children and mass is that if they're quietly looking at a book about God, the Virgin Mary, or the saints and not hitting or otherwise antagonizing their sibling, that counts as prayer.
I never grab all of these books at once: usually I'll grab two or three and toss them in my backpack/ purse right before we head out the door for mass. We keep all our "religious" books together in one place that the kids can't access very easily, so this doesn't involve a last moment frantic run around the house on my part. (I have mixed feelings about them not being readily accessible, but it does have the effect of keeping the books special for Sunday mornings and prayer time (we also allow the kids to look at them during our decade of the Rosary at night)).
Here are seven that more or less regularly make the cut, in no particular order. Some I'm more fond of than others, but all of them I consider "suitable" and they all more or less hold our kids' attention.
I've included links so you can buy them if you're so inclined. I have no affiliate anything (I'm not even sure how one would go about doing that), I'm just including them for convenience's sake. Most of the links are secondhand sources: many of the books we have I found secondhand at thrift stores, online, or they were given to us. Out of all the books in this list, there's only two that I've bought new.
One "book" isn't even a proper book at all.
We have a copy of this printed in 1992 (it was a thrift store find), back when the publisher was Gold 'n' Honey Books. Currently a version of this is being published by Zondervan, but the illustrations look different and I have no idea if they've revised the text. The provided link is to an ebay listing of the version that I have.
This is not the most beautiful children's bible in the world. The illustrations are very cartoonish, and everyone has weird bug eyes for some reason.
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| I mean look at these things. |
The text is well done though. They do a good job translating the stories into an easy to read and understand format (I'd estimate about a 1st or 2nd grade reading level). It is a Protestant written text, so Jesus's words at the Last Supper are reduced to, "whenever you eat the bread and drink the wine, remember me", but this is the only real gripe I have with it.
It holds my kids' attention pretty well (Little Boy has read the creation account several times), and it's got enough stories in it that I can usually find a version of whatever the Gospel or the Old Testament reading was, so I can open it to that page and give it to Little Boy, or quietly read it to Little Girl during the homily.
They don't seem to mind the bug eyes.
2.) Tomie dePaola's Book of Bible Stories
dePaola used stories directly from the New International Version of the Bible in this book, so none of them are condensed down for children in any way. This means that the text is much less likely to be tampered with or compromised, you're getting it more or less from the horse's mouth, but it also means that it's a little less accessible.
The illustrations, however, are gorgeous (pretty much a given with all of dePaola's work) and colorful. The kids both love looking at them, as do I. This one makes it to Church with us pretty much every week, and is pretty much always looked at for awhile by one or the other of them.
There aren't very many stories from the New Testament in the book, which is probably my one problem with it. dePaola wrote a book specifically of stories from the New Testament called The Miracles of Jesus, so there are more stories of the life of Christ illustrated by him out there, just not in this book (or, alas, in my collection). There are still more than enough to justify having this book around though.
3.) A series of not-spectacular illustrations about the mass from a Kindergarten RE curriculum someone cut out out of a workbook, laminated, and connected with key rings.
It's not that pretty, there's only seven pages, the illustrations are very bare bones, and it was obviously meant to be one of those projects that kids in RE classes cut out, staple together, bring home, and then promptly lose under the couch or throw away. Despite that, it's really caught the attention of Little Girl, and she likes using it to follow along where we are in the mass. She'll sit and quietly leaf through it, or I'll point out where we are in the mass in the book and she'll make the connection.
Go figure, but it's probably the second most used and enjoyed book after the dePaola Bible Stories one.
This one does a great job of holding Little Girl's (and sometimes Little Boy's) attention, and the illustrations are very detailed and pretty, but it's honestly my least favorite one on this list. It was given to me: I'm actually pretty glad that I didn't spend any money to get it.
In all fairness, it does have a pretty decent collection of apparitions and the illustrations are full page, colorful, and do a fantastic job keeping the kiddos' attention.
My issues with it-- I am not a fan of DeStefano's rhyming text here, it's simply not that well done. It's not bad, but it's nothing very good either.
There is very little of substance about most of the apparitions, so it doesn't work well as an "about" book about them (not that I think it's trying to be).
My biggest gripe with it is that illustrator's choices in portraying Our Lady of Guadalupe drive me crazy.
I live in a very culturally Tejano (Texas Hispanic) area in Texas, so I probably have a bit of a bias. She is absolutely synonymous with the religious and cultural identity of the people here. There's a huge wooden billboard sized image of her at the local parish, and in MOST locally owned restaurants, mechanic shops, or other businesses there's an image of her in plain view behind the front desk. Most of the people here are Latino with dark skin and hair, and most depictions of Our Lady of Guadalupe show her that way too.
So for me, it's very jarring that the depiction in this book shows her as a very pale Anglo woman with light brown hair and St. Juan Diago as a very Spanish- European looking fellow rather than a Native American one. The same woman is used for all the apparitions in the book, and I understand that they were going for consistency. And the book is about the different outfits that Mary wears when she visits, not what she herself looks like, I get that. It probably would have been distracting to switch out the models, or to have an obvious ethnic difference between her and St. Juan Diego.
But it still really gets under my skin, not least because Our Lady showing up as a mixed race woman with clearly native heritage appearing to a full blood native Aztec convert in that particular time and place was a HUGE deal and an important part of her message.
(Not a book, but if you want to see an example of this story done right and in a way that honors all the complexity involved while still being accessible for kids, I highly suggest this DVD. dePaola (my goodness, he comes up a lot, doesn't he?) also did a beautiful book on it, though it's a bit pricey because it's out of print (we've gotten it from the library). Heck, there's even a good episode of Wishbone on it (and you get to relive the 90s a little bit)).
It's not a big enough flaw for me to actually discard the book, especially since I know my children are surrounded by much better depictions of that particular apparition (and because it does such a good job of keeping their attention), but is enough that I still find myself going off on rants about it in Facebook comment sections whenever this book comes up.
And on here, apparently.
If you buy it, buy it for the pictures rather than the text, and balance it out with better depictions of Our Lady of Guadalupe.
Another dePaola book, and one that gets a lot of use when we bring it.
The one I have (and have linked to) is actually a reformatted and re-print of the book by Magnificat and Ignatius Press. The original went out of print several years ago.
Like all of dePaola's books, it's beautiful. It's stories from the life of Mary, mostly from scripture but a few are from tradition (Mary being raised in the Temple, and St. Joseph's staff bursting into a spray of lilies before their betrothal). Unlike his book of Bible stories, dePaola writes out a narrative here for each story, and begins each one with the antiphon from a feast day associated or connected with the story in some way.
6.) Sitting Like a Saint: Catholic Mindfulness for Kids
This is one that we bought new, and I honestly think I like it better than the kids do.
They do like the illustrations, and will occasionally pick it up to flip through them, but this one mostly lies neglected on the pew when we bring it to Church. It isn't a story or series of stories: it's a series of exercises meant to teach mindfulness and to help children gain skills to regulate their emotions, each with a small meditation on and illustration of a saint associated with that skill.
We have done some of the exercises in it at home, and those have been useful, especially for our more high-strung, anxious child (who shall remain unidentified here for privacy's sake). I think it was worth the purchase and to have in our home, but it doesn't work very well for Sunday mornings or casual reading.
7.) The Life of Jesus: An Illustrated Rosary
This book is a bit pricey, but was well worth the purchase.
The kids' great grandmother sent us some Christmas money for them, and this was the first thing I spent it on. I don't remember where I saw this book suggested but I'm very glad I did: most other books on the mysteries of the rosary that I've found either don't have any illustrations or the illustrations and text are cheap and/or corny feeling.
I originally purchased it for our family decade of the Rosary, and it we read the night's mystery regularly, but it's also found its way with us to Church once or twice.
The illustrations are really unique. The artist used a wooden figure model, various dolls, and random household objects to create a still life of each mystery, and then painted a picture of it, adding details as she felt moved to. The results are surprisingly reverent and thought provoking- noticing the details in the painting and wondering why the artist put them there more often than not invites a meditation on the mystery itself. She also did a wonderful job with the text. She keeps each mystery simple but manages to evoke a lot of thought and sympathy for whatever part of the story she's depicting.
The kids like and appreciate the text and illustrations, they're well done enough that I get a lot out of the book as well, and it's enriched our family prayer time. This is probably my favorite book on this list.
That's all folks! Check here on Friday for the rest of this week's Quick Takes.
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