This report was submitted by WRF Baord Chair Dr. Rick Perrin. Dr. Perrin serves as Senior Pastor of Covenant Presbyterian Church in Cherry Hill, New Jersey, and may be contacted at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

Covenant Presbyterian Church in Cherry Hill, New Jersey, will hold its seventh annual Children's Prayer Festival on Saturday morning, May 2, 2009. Community "helpers" including law enforcement, fire fighters, local government officials, medical people, education leaders and others, including the church, will set up booths in the church parking lot. Games and food make the event fun, as will a hook and ladder fire truck with its ladder fully extended. Children from the church's preschool ministry and church families will be issued a booklet of prayers, and leaders will escort the children from booth to booth to hear community helpers explain their service. Children will then pray the appropriate prayer. The church invites community families by challenging parents to consider their children's spiritual needs, as they do physical and intellectual needs, through this "spiritual" exercise. The church then follows up by inviting families to take part in church ministries. Hundreds of children attend.