Conversations about L.I.F.E.
A Guided Program to Get Families Talking About Loving Relationships and Safe Environments
Parent-Child Conversations Make a Difference
Conversations about L.I.F.E. is based on these little-recognized facts. The L.I.F.E. program is a series of downloadable lesson packages offering relationship education and safe environment training for children and adolescents with their parents. The program offers one age-appropriate session per year for each grade level from pre-kindergarten through high school. Each lesson package includes master copies of an easy-to-follow lesson plan, a corresponding slide presentation, an activity book, and a parent follow-up packet to be printed and distributed as needed. All aspects of the program are designed to encourage parent-child conversations about Love, Infatuation, Friendship, and Exploitation — as the individual child is experiencing them now, at this stage of his or her personal development.
The Conversations about L.I.F.E. lessons can be used with children in a parish school, a religious education program, or a youth ministry setting. While they are designed to guide facilitated parent-child sessions, they can also be adapted for many other environments: classrooms, religious education sessions, youth retreats, and talks for teens with parents or without.
Meet Compliance Standards
In recent years the Catholic Church has issued several documents concerning the sexuality education of children, outlining requirements for education and training:
2002 Charter
The 2002 Charter requiring that all children be given annual “safe environment” lessons to help them recognize and avoid sexual abuse.
View Charter
2008 USCCB
The 2008 USCCB document mandating chastity education for children of all ages.
View Publication
2016 Exhortation
The 2016 exhortation, Amoris Laetitia, in which Pope Francis encourages parents to discuss important topics such as sexuality with their own children.
View Exhortation2020 Directory for Catechesis
In 2020 the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of the New Evangelization published a new catechetical document which "reinterprets" the goal of catechesis to focus on the process of accompaniment. The new Directory calls the catechized (and the catechist!) to a deepened communion with Christ. It also gives special attention to family catechesis—catechesis in the family, with the family, and of the family—as the human base on which Christian faith is built.
Conversations about L.I.F.E. provides a vehicle to help parishes and schools satisfy these mandates in one comprehensive, evidence-based research program. Through downloadable, age-appropriate activities, faith-based lessons, and parental participation, Conversations about L.I.F.E. teaches children how to understand and develop healthy, loving relationships, and, conversely, how to identify and avoid sexual abuse.
Each Conversations about L.I.F.E. lesson package download includes:
Lesson Plan
A detailed, easy-to-follow, comprehensive Lesson Plan, including master copies of the materials needed to teach the lesson, that can be printed or copied as needed
PowerPoint
A corresponding PowerPoint presentation, compatible with PowerPoint and Keynote, which both guides the facilitator through the lesson and directs the parent-child conversations
Activity Book
A master Activity Book with creative exercises to keep children involved, that can be printed or copied as needed for each session
Classroom Adaptation
A Classroom Adaptation of the lesson for any circumstance in which the parents cannot be present
Parent Follow-Up
A master Parent Follow-up Packet that can be printed or copied as needed, to guide at-home discussions of materials deemed too sensitive for the classroom version
Real Educators with Decades of Hands-On Experience
Conversations about L.I.F.E. was written, tested, refined, and perfected by Dr. Kathie Amidei and Sister Kieran Sawyer.
Conversations about L.I.F.E. was developed from first-hand, real-life experience. Both authors have spent decades facilitating parent-child conversations. Both have directed actual programs during which parents talk with their own children about important life issues such as relationships, sexuality, and abuse. Thus Conversations about L.I.F.E. is based on real experience in the field, coupled with evidence-based research strategies. It is a comprehensive and effective tool for both relationship education and safe environment training.
The Conversations about L.I.F.E. program was financed by LoveEd, Inc, a non-profit organization dedicated to providing easy-to-use, age-appropriate educational materials to aid teachers, catechists, homeschoolers, and any family seeking guidance for open conversations on chastity, fostering safe environments, and empowering young people to make healthy and safe choices regarding love, relationships, and how to avoid exploitative or harmful situations.
Sister Kieran Sawyer, SSND
Sister Kieran Sawyer, SSND, is nationally recognized for her creative work in youth ministry and catechesis. Over the years she taught religion at all levels of grade and high school, in religious education programs, and in youth retreats. She has also presented numerous training workshops for religion teachers and youth ministers across the country.
Dr. Kathie Amidei
Dr. Kathie Amidei serves as Pastoral Associate at St. Anthony on the Lake Parish in Pewaukee, Wisconsin. She was formerly the Associate Director for Catechesis and Child Ministry for the Archdiocese of Milwaukee and has served in a number of parishes as a teacher and a director of religious education. She is a wife, mother, and grandmother.
Lesson Guidance and Support
Conversations about L.I.F.E. is the product of years of experience and education. It is founded in theology and the belief that sexuality and authentic love are gifts from God. This website has been designed to provide all of the information you will need to offer a successful program that meets both safe environment training and chastity education requirements. Use our program support pages for additional guidance on how to schedule, prepare for, and present the program.
Program SupportContact Us
This picture symbolizes the deepest goals of the entire Conversations about L.I.F.E. program — to assist parents in the most important responsibility of their lives, loving their children and helping them to develop into competent, loving adults. Sister Kieran Sawyer and Dr. Kathie Amidei have spent many decades working with parishes and dioceses to create methods and materials that are comfortable, doable, and effective in achieving these goals. Please reach out to them if you have any questions about their program or suggestions for how to improve it. Sister Kieran and Dr. Kathie are also available for in-person and online presentations regarding the Conversations about L.I.F.E. lessons.
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