‘Won’t you be my neighbor?’

MEMPHIS — While Fred Rogers, the beloved Presbyterian pastor and children’s television pioneer, is perhaps best known for creating the TV “Neighborhood of Make-Believe,” the fictional community of his imagination became remarkably real as a roomful of Christian educators embodied his vision and celebrated his legacy.

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No longer confined to the world of make-believe, erstwhile strangers attending a workshop at the Association of Partners in Christian Education (APCE) 2025 Annual Event quickly became neighbors.

And friends.

As the animated participants cheerfully colored and conversed around tables in the generous, warm and interactive space led by Miatta Wilson, they wistfully recalled — and openly shared with one another — their earliest memories of the beloved early childhood educator and television personality.

“I grew up with Mister Rogers,” said Josh Archey, commissioned pastor of Crossroads Presbyterian Church in Commerce Township, Michigan. “I really gravitated toward his message, his inclusiveness.”

As did Wilson.

Wilson, an associate in the Office of Christian Formation for the Interim Unified Agency of the PC(USA), told the group that she remembers watching “Mister Rogers Neighborhood” for the first time at the age of three on a “little black & white TV.”

In fact, the origins of her Jan. 31 APCE workshop, titled, “Won’t You Be My Neighbor? A Simple, Unassuming Question. Or Is It?,” lie deep within her own faith story.

“I am a Fred Rogers ‘groupie,’ wearing my socks and sweater,” Wilson would later say at the APCE awards dinner that evening after being recognized as APCE’s Enrich Educator of the Year. “My ministry, our ministry and work, I believe, among other things, is about neighborliness, the kind Fred Rogers lived both on the screen and off. Neighborliness is being kind, helpful, thoughtful, welcoming, curious, listening, friendly and a willingness to live in harmony. This is something desperately needed by our communities, country and world.”

After sharing with the group some of Fred Rogers’s history and background — as well as inviting them to contribute what they knew about Rogers — Wilson dedicated much of her workshop to exploring Fred Rogers’ “Six Fundamentals of Learning.”

The “six fundamentals” are the educational principles that “inform and inspire the research, resources, professional learning opportunities, and community building work” of the Fred Rogers Institute at St. Vincent College in Latrobe, Pennsylvania, through which she was part of an online cohort of educators last year.

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Included with Wilson’s introduction to each of the six — which are (1) a sense of self-worth, (2) a sense of trust, (3) curiosity, (4) the capacity to look and listen carefully, (5) the capacity to play, and (6) times of solitude — were conversation starters for the “neighbors” to engage around their respective tables.

As members called out their responses to the various prompts Wilson offered, the Rev. Dr. Deborah Huggins, associate pastor of Youth and Children at Central Presbyterian Church in Summit, New Jersey, said of “curiosity” that her congregation models “I wonder” questions with children.

“We try to cultivate questioning as part of the walk of faith,” she said.

Following a closing section devoted to “Fred and Faith” — Fred as neighbor, Fred as peacemaker — Wilson introduced the group to a host of resources created, compiled and curated by the Office of Christian Formation.

Wilson’s previewing and sharing several of the many available resources also served as a timely reminder for congregations to join with the PC(USA) in celebrating Mr. Rogers Day on Thursday, March 20, which would have been Fred Rogers’s 97th birthday.

For Wilson, the time she spent in Memphis among her ministry colleagues was indeed “a beautiful day in this neighborhood – the neighborhood of APCE.”

“Now,” she offered as a charge, “let us go and be good neighbors.”

Click here to access all the Mr. Rogers Day resource pages.