Materials Manuals Subscription

CGS Materials are meant to lead to a vital relationship with God. 

CGSUSA is working to offer up-to-date Materials Manuals to members, online.

In respect for the dignity of the Catechesis of the Good Shepherd materials that have been developed over fifty years of working with the child, the National Association recognizes the importance of providing catechists with excellent, up-to-date directions as they prepare their hearts and the atrium environment for the child.  The Materials Manuals will offer directions for the essential materials needed for presentations with photos from Sofia and Gianna’s atrium in Rome and from USA atrias, how-to links, essential information, downloadable, print ready PDFs, Episcopal Adaptations and more.  Subscribers will receive email alerts with up-dates and changes, including changes to materials as necessary with the implementation of the Roman Missal, Third Edition.   

Level I Materials Manual is now being offered as a Three-Year Online Subscription, in the Members Only section of www.cgsusa.org to catechists who:

• embrace the importance of preparing the materials as much as possible themselves and in keeping with the Characteristics of the Catechesis of the Good Shepherd developed by Sofia Cavalletti and Gianna Gobbi and the International Consiglio
• are in the process of Level I Formation or have completed their Level I Formation, and
• are members of the National Association of the Catechesis of the Good Shepherd (see Become a Member)

Looking Ahead

The Level I Materials Manual is now available on our website.  The cost of a Three-Year Subscription to the Level I Materials Manual is $30.00.  CGSUSA membership must be maintained to access the subscription.  

The Level II Materials Manual is anticipated to be available early Summer, 2012.   Subscriptions will be available to members who are in a Level II Formation course, or who have already completed a Level II Formation course.

The Level III Materials Manual is currently available on CD through the CGSUSA Publication Catalog. This manual will be converted to an online Materials Manual by 2012.  The Level III CD is available to members who are in a Level III Formation course or who have already completed Level III Formation.

Members who meet the criteria outlined above will be eligible to subscribe to any one, two or three manuals.  A Three-Year Subscription for one manual is $30; any two manuals is $50; and all three manuals is $70.  On-going membership in CGSUSA is required. 

What Makes the CGS Materials So Important?

Gianna Gobbi called the materials “indications of the hidden reality of God. They are concrete helps to know the language, times and places of the mystery of God. The child will make the mystery his own, according to his own nature, his own capacities and his own personal rhythm of learning. With due respect for the differences, we can say that the materials do what liturgy does. Our relationship with God is established through sensible objects, respecting a fundamental human exigency.”
The environment that is prepared for the child declares that God, unknowable and transcendent, can be reached through the signs.

“At the root of... the Catechesis of the Good Shepherd is the continuous evidence that God and the child are already in relationship and that children possess a unique capacity to respond to God’s loving initiative.  For five decades Sofia and Gianna collected, and Sofia continues to collect, this evidence, and out of it they have fashioned the contents of the atrium... Over the years, these two founding mothers were astounded to discover that the children, by themselves, had selected the core of Christian belief, omitting nothing that was essential.”