A former teacher at Grove City Our Lady of Perpetual Help School (OLPH) has published a children’s book with Ascension Press.

Melissa Kirking, who lives in Texas, is the author of Jesus + Me: Talking with My Greatest Friend. She said the book is a product of her heart’s work, and it began when a seed was planted there while teaching at OLPH in the 1990s.

Msgr. Romano Ciotola, the pastor of OLPH Church at the time, asked teachers to bring their students to First Friday Adoration.

“You want me to do what?” Kirking said, recalling her initial reaction to the prospect of bringing her 32 first-grade students to an hour of Adoration.

However, she said the experience proved to be life changing for her and became something she and the students looked forward to every month.

“After that first one, I was like, ‘This is amazing, this is beautiful, this is what our children need,’” Kirking said. “All of the sudden that light went on, and Jesus planted this seed. … This is what Jesus is calling me to do.”

Kirking left after two years at OLPH when her husband finished his  master’s program at Ohio State University, and they moved home.

“At that point, I came home, back to Texas, on fire to do something,” she said. 

For the next 27 years following her call to bring children to Adoration, Kirking wrote down ideas she received from the Lord in prayer. The ideas came to fruition in her book.

“I took what I did at OLPH and that love of bringing children to the Eucharistic Lord because that’s where they belong, that’s where they grow and that’s where they make that friendship with Him deeper,” she said.

Kirking currently serves as the coordinator of children’s Adoration at her parish outside of Austin,  and she runs the website GuidedChildrensAdoration.com, which she created for parents, teachers and catechists.

“Our call is to bring children to Adoration and guide them,” she said. “With any new skill, children need guidance. You think of an adult who walks into Adoration – they have a book or their rosary. … We need to do it in a way that is age appropriate and calls the children and tugs on their heart.”

Kirking said her book was also largely inspired by Pope St. John Paul II’s quote that Jesus is the “Divine Friend,” from his 1979 Corpus Christi Sunday homily.

“In order to have that divine friendship with Jesus, we talk to Him outside of Mass, too,” Kirking said.

For this reason, children can use Jesus + Me at home, while sitting outside or in church before Mass in addition to being used in an Adoration chapel, she said.

The book is designed for children ages 7 to 10. Kirking said it can also be used by those younger than 7 with guidance.

Jesus + Me aims to “describe to the children how Jesus talks so that they understand that, no, they (might) not hear Him in that audible voice they’re used to hearing their parents or their friends talk to them, but there’s other ways that Jesus talks. He talks in the stillness, Scripture, silence, a feeling or sometimes through other people.”

Kirking said she assured children in her book that Jesus will never tell them to do something wrong or anything that goes against Scripture, so that children are not mislead when learning to hear His voice.

Jesus + Me: Talking with My Greatest Friend is divided into four types of prayer: praise, contrition, thanksgiving and petition. To make the types of prayer relatable for children, Kirking categorized contrition as “being sorry” and petition as “asking Jesus.”

Each category includes 20  prayers – ones children are comfortable with, ones that might stretch them and introduce them to a new way of talking with Jesus and some that have a bonus activity. She said she hopes that children will bring their prayer life into their daily life.

The book includes various prayer activities and prayer experiences that offer children different ways to pray.

“My vision with the book … the goal would be to pick one of each prayer style and go through it,” Kirking said. “They may not get to all four prayer experiences, and that is OK, too.”

The prayer experiences are numbered, so children can pick whichever one appeals to them on a given day.

Kirking said she incorporated prayers of contrition so children’s “hearts stay closer and connected to Jesus” and “if (children) are thinking about being sorry on a more frequent basis, then they’re less likely to get too far” off track before needing to turn back around.

With prayers of contrition, Kirking said she wants children to know the depth of God’s mercy and love. She does not want children to be afraid or feel that God cannot forgive them.

The prayers of praise, she said, are not as easy or common for children. She likens praising Jesus to “giving compliments to friends on earth” and encourages children to give compliments to Jesus as well.

Each category in the book includes quotations from popes, the Scriptures and saints.

“There’s also – I like to call it – imaginative prayer where the kids can close their eyes,” Kirking said.

She included imaginative experiences such as thinking about a candle shining in the dark or an amazing sunset or the feeling of a warm blanket to draw connections to physical experiences that children will understand.

“Prayers like that will then connect later on in life, or maybe the next day when they see beautiful sunsets and (think), ‘Oh, that’s like Jesus,’ and bring them back,” Kirking said.

At the end of the book, there is a call to Adoration.

“The book could be used in any situation, but with my heart’s love and my heart’s work we put the call to Adoration in so … families who already go to Adoration have a resource (and) families that maybe use it at home or at church see the call to Adoration, and that might put the desire in their heart to take their children to Adoration, as well, and experience it in that way,” she said.

Kirking said Jesus + Me pairs nicely with the National Eucharistic Revival, which is taking place in the United States from 2022 to 2025.

“In this revival we’re wanting to create Eucharistic splendor again,” she said. “With having the call to Adoration in here, it definitely gives the children an opportunity to go to Adoration and experience a meaningful time with Him and develop that relationship with Him, which then makes their desire to come to Mass stronger and their desire to pray outside (of Mass) with Him.”

Kirking said children have different interests, personalities and strengths, and so some will connect with certain prayer activities in the book more than others. She hopes the result of the book will be the same.

“I just want children to come and know our Eucharistic Lord,” she said.

Jesus and Me: Talking with My Greatest Friend is available for purchase at www.ascensionpress.com/jesusandme