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As the U.S. prepares to celebrate its 250th birthday, a faith organization is urging parents to make the most of Independence Day by reconnecting with their kids and taking time to teach them about the nation’s founding ideals.
Ahead of July 4, Communio, a faith-based organization focused on strengthening families, released its “Great American Family Fun Kit,” complete with activity ideas, recipes for patriotic treats, and a prayer for the nation. Some of the activities include trying to use 18th-century slang, making a gratitude jar, creating a family flag and having an Independence Day-themed scavenger hunt.
“When you think about all the holidays we have as a country, the Fourth of July, the Independence Day is — of our non-religious holidays — it’s right up there with Thanksgiving as being the most important family celebration that we have as a country,” Communio founder and president J.P. De Gance told Fox News Digital.
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Communio is using its partnerships that cover 17,000 churches across the U.S. to reach out to families and encourage them to celebrate Independence Day through neighborhood gatherings, block parties and activities to build their communities.
“The most fundamental building block of a society is not the individual, it’s the family,” De Gance said.
De Gance told Fox News Digital that Communio’s Great American Family Fun Kit reflects the organization’s belief that strong families are the foundation of strong communities.
“I think there’s a lot of recent polling data that shows love of country, good old-fashioned patriotism, has declined in our nation amongst a lot of folks. And the goal here is to tie people back to the ideals of our founding and do so in a really grassroots, organic way at the local level,” De Gance said of Communio’s Great American Family Fun Kit.
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While the kit’s activities are centered around America’s 250th birthday, De Gance said their broader purpose is to encourage families to spend more meaningful time together away from screens. The Communio founder and president asserted that even simple activities can create these opportunities for parents and children to connect.
“One of the things that we know about family life is that parents and kids who communicate regularly, those kids report a more warm and good relationship with mom and dad,” De Gance told Fox News Digital. He added that children who have good relationships with their parents tend to have better long-term outcomes and are more likely to see faith as an important part of their lives.
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While at first glance, the kit appears to be geared toward families with younger children, it also contains activities aimed at teen engagement too. De Gance suggested that the scavenger hunt activity could be used to get children of different ages to do something together.
De Gance also pointed to rising rates of reported loneliness and sadness among American teenagers, arguing that family time could be key to combatting these issues.
“I think if we were honest with ourselves… there’s probably not a high number of those kids who would report having frequent time with their family and siblings and recreation and fun together, right?” he said. “Because when that happens, they’re more likely to report having a good relationship with their mom and dad, and they’re less likely to report being lonely and being isolated.”
As he looks to America’s future, De Gance would like to see a revival of healthy marriages and family life across the nation. He said he is hopeful that young people are becoming more focused on finding purpose in “enduring things,” such as faith, marriage and family.
“The pathway to making sure that we celebrate America 300 and America 350 and America 400, really runs through the family,” he said.
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