We Believe: The Three-Year Rotation
A three-year rotation for Armenian Sunday Schools, ages 5 to 17
What Is Different in This Edition?
The two earlier We Believe curricula have served our Sunday Schools for a generation, and parishes teaching from them today are teaching sound material. This edition is not a correction of them. It responds to conditions that have changed since they were written.
The lessons are shorter by design, so children can enter the sanctuary for the second half of the Badarak rather than spend the Divine Liturgy in a classroom learning about it. Children are grouped in four age bands on a three-year rotation rather than in a separate book for every grade, so that a parish with twenty students and a parish with two hundred can teach the same material in the same season, and a family that moves between parishes continues without interruption. And the prayers, hymns, and Armenian terms our children are meant to carry with them are written into every lesson rather than left to be picked up elsewhere. The aim has not changed. Only the shape of the hour has.
We will not hide them from their children, shewing to the generation to come the praises of the Lord,
and his strength, and his wonderful works that he hath done.
-Psalm 78:4
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October 2026
Sunday, October 4 | Season of the Holy Cross
We raised the Holy Cross at the Exaltation and found it hidden in the mountain at Varak. This Sunday we take it up. Ages 5 to 7 meet the heavenly hosts and discover that at every Badarak we sing the angels' own song. Ages 8 to 10 follow St. Gregory into Khor Virab and learn how his courage brought Armenia to Christ. Ages 11 to 13 learn why the Gospel is lifted high and why our Church calls the Bible the Breath of God. Ages 14 and up hear Christ's call to take up the cross and follow Him, and ask what they are carrying that no one else can see.
Sunday, October 25 | Season of the Holy Cross: The Discovery of the Holy Cross
This Sunday, the Church celebrates the Discovery of the Holy Cross, the last of the four feasts of the Cross, and we begin our second unit. Ages 5 to 7 walk into the garden God planted and learn what was lost there. Ages 8 to 10 meet Abraham, the first man to leave everything behind on God’s word alone. Ages 11 to 13 ask what faith actually is, and what it is not. Ages 14 and up stand with St. Helena over three identical crosses and learn that the true one was known by what it did.
Sunday, October 11 | Season of the Holy Cross: The Feast of the Holy Translators
On Saturday the Church keeps the Feast of the Holy Translators, who gave our people God's word in their own tongue. Ages 5 to 7 discover the Bible as God's gift and learn why we call it the Breath of God. Ages 8 to 10 meet St. Mashdots and learn that the first words written in Armenian came from Scripture. Ages 11 to 13 enter the heart of the Badarak, Holy Communion, and learn how we prepare to receive it with reverence. Ages 14 and up sit with Christ across from the temple treasury and learn that He measures a gift by what it costs.
Sunday, October 18 | Season of the Holy Cross
This Sunday closes our first unit, and many parishes keep it as Living the Divine Liturgy Family Worship Day. Ages 5 to 7 learn what a priest is for, and how the Church teaches us about God. Ages 8 to 10 follow the Armenian Church across the ocean and into America. Ages 11 to 13 look at icons, incense and Holy Myron, and learn why our worship speaks to every sense. Ages 14 and up stand in the synagogue at Nazareth and hear a hometown ask whether this is only Joseph’s son.
September 2026
Sunday, September 13 | Season of the Holy Cross
On the Sunday nearest September 14, the Armenian Church lifts up the Holy Cross. The cross is adorned with basil, and the blessing of Antasdan is given toward the four corners of the earth. Our tradition teaches that the Tree of Life, lost in Eden, was restored on Golgotha.
Sunday, September 20 | Season of the Holy Cross
Last Sunday we lifted up the Holy Cross. This Sunday our students step through the doors. Unit One opens inside the church itself. Ages 5 to 7 learn that the church is a home and an ark, and that it keeps our faith safe. Ages 8 to 10 meet the priest, the deacon, and the acolyte, and learn how to greet them properly. Ages 11 to 13 walk from the narthex to the apse and discover that nothing in the building is there by accident: the church teaches before a word is spoken.
Sunday, September 27 | Season of the Holy Cross: Holy Cross of Varak
Two weeks after the Exaltation, the Armenian Church keeps a feast that belongs to no other Church. Our tradition teaches that St. Hripsime, fleeing Rome, carried a piece of the True Cross into Armenia and hid it in the rocks of Mount Varak. It lay there for three hundred years, until a light drew the hermit Totig to the place, and the light shone for twelve days.
Year One Curriculum Plan
All Age Groups September to May
Year Two Curriculum Plan
All Age Groups September to May
Year Three Curriculum Plan
All Age Groups September to May