sunday school

I wonder if there are still any of those quaint attempts to religiously educate our young souls by sending them to ‘Sunday schools’ anymore? I doubt it. Today, Sundays are more likely to be spent wandering around B&Q, Ikea or MFI than taking the collection in church. I doubt also, whether many children who have experienced it, would like to go back to their youth to re-live even one day of it. I hated Sunday school almost as much as I hated regular school. The saving grace was that it only lasted an hour or so and there was no arithmetic or spelling lessons to tax my poor brain. The downside was that it ruined my whole Sunday.

Before we had all-day tv, computers and electronic games machines for entertainment, the average child would be out playing with their mates in the streets around their houses. They would be up to their necks in muck, grass stains and various cuts and grazes by the end of the day. For those of us unfortunate to be members of a Sunday school, there was no such pleasure on Sundays. The first restriction was that you had to wear your very best clothes and be spotlessly clean. So the day got off to a bad start by having to have a bath, whether or not you’d already had one that week! Then you were trussed up in all those horrible, clean new clothes that were normally only worn for such occasions as visits to/from relatives, Sunday School and the odd wedding. They never fitted properly because they were bought a size or two too big for you to ‘grow into’, or you had already grown out of them. You had to take care not to rip or dirty them for the rest of the day, which meant – no playing out.

We’d walk the half-mile to the Methodist Church. The urge to kick stones, climb trees or throw dirty sticks at anything on the way, had to be curbed so we arrived pristine. None of our family was a Methodist and neither of my parents ever attended, so God knows why we had to go! The classes were held in back rooms of the Church before the morning service. Some of the less fortunate kids had to join their parents in the service after classes, but most of us would be released. It must have had some benefit because I remember the terrific sense of elation when it ended!

The classes were split into age groups. The youngest had ‘nice’ Bible stories read to them. They would sing a few childish hymns like ‘All things bright and beautiful’ and draw pictures of palm trees, lambs, shepherds, wise men, baby Jesus, Joseph’s dream coat, Easter eggs and bunnies and other such biblical scenes. Older children would have more serious stories read to them about plagues of locusts in Egypt, Jesus throwing a wobbly in the Synagogue and various nasty characters of the day, like Pontius Pilate and King Herod. Fitting these stories into a meaningful theme was no easy task for me, but the general impression was that all religious activity happened in either Egypt, Bethlehem, Jerusalem or Palestine (wherever they were) and that God, Jesus and Santa Claus were all basically good guys, as long as you behaved yourself. If you didn’t, then “woe betide you.” No presents at Christmas and watch out for the ‘Holy Ghost’ who knew everything you did and who was sure to scare the living daylights out of you. This was enough of a threat to ensure we got home equally pristine by resisting the urge to kick stones, climb trees or throw dirty sticks at anything on the way back.

Several times a year there was a “special” day. There was the Christmas party, where we would be treated to a magnificent culinary spread of potted beef, egg and cress sarnies, jelly and blanchmange. Games such as “Beetle Drive”, “Snap” and “Lexicon” provided hours of riotous fun, So did the surreptitious forages into the store rooms where there was an old piano. There was always someone showing off by playing both parts of Chopsticks. My friend Terry and I didn’t possess such talents, but using a couple of walking sticks for guitars, did a great impersonation of The Shadows playing Apache.

There was the annual prize giving for good attendance that usually consisted of a children’s book containing bible stories, pictures of palm trees, lambs, shepherds etc. Also annually was the Harvest Festival. We were encouraged to make up packs of goodies using old shoeboxes filled with fruit, bread, or tinned food. Sometimes, an odd child brought a shoebox full of coal, which was clearly inedible and caused derision from the rest of the fruit-wielding mob. What puzzled me – we were led to believe they were offerings to God to celebrate all the good things that had come our way over the last year. Why would he need those things as he had apparently created the whole universe by magic? How would he collect them – I had never once seen him actually attend Sunday school or Church for that matter? I later discovered they gave it all to old people. who presumably would have starved otherwise, so that was good.

We also had the occasional day trip. Holidays were a rare thing for us, so this seemed like a great treat. We visited far-flung places like Southport, Bolton Abbey and Knaresborough. Unfortunately it was marred for me because I suffered with travel sickness. It usually resulted in throwing up into a grease-proof sarnie bag, which had been saved by some well organised adult, who was familiar with kids and travelling.

When Sunday school finished, it wasn’t much better. We weren’t allowed to change into our old clothes and play out with our mates. Those who weren’t made to go to Sunday school and there for lacked moral fibre, would no doubt end up as thieves and murderers! We were allowed to do quiet and ‘clean’ activities: reading, writing, or playing inside with our toys, just as long as we stayed spotless. This was ten times more liberty than my mother had been allowed. The expectations on her generation were that you spent the rest of Sunday reading the Bible. If she visited her auntie, she would be allowed to sew or knit, but that was considered a moral sin by the more staunch thinkers of the day.

At the start of this, I gave the impression that Sunday school was a fate worse than death for most kids. Looking back, there are some fond memories and the moral code of conduct it encouraged in us, did no harm at all. There was no glue sniffing, graffiti or vandalism from bored kids who don’t appreciate the values of respect and decent behaviour. Maybe the kids of today would benefit too, from drawing pictures of palm trees, lambs, shepherds etc and the threat of that Holy Ghost watching their every move!