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Monthly Archives: February 2009

Our Carbon Thumbprint: Recycling Ash Wednesday

First of all, let me begin by saying parts of this blog posting are recycled from a previous newsletter article. That is appropriate for Ash Wednesday: recycling. Somehow as we border on the great outdoors springing to new life, we focus today on the great cosmic bummer: we are going to die.

The church loves turning endings into beginnings and beginnings into endings. The worship spaces are full at Christmas, Easter and, surprising for me, today, Ash Wednesday. This ancient practice perhaps is one of the most universal faith practice. It is practiced across denominations and faiths–this smudging to try on death. It satisfies that universal existential wonder in a safe time and place.

It also shows a divine relationship: self, others, God and nature. Enlightened communities of faith are finally catching on to God’s call to have “dominion” over all the earth. Dominion is to be God-like: a faithful servant, a loving care-giver, one who cherishes. It seems we are just now getting this as faith communities: we are a part of a continually re-created ecosystem, and today is the high holy day for that understanding. How does our body, mind, soul and actions feed our environment? Today, we ponder our carbon thumbprint.

A great Austin educator and author, Donna Bryant Goertz, addresses a playground squabble of two children by calmly placing a hand on the shoulder of each and saying, “Two hurt children, one that has been hurt, and one that has done the hurting.”

The carbon thumbprint of the cross on our forehead , is that embrace between the hurt and one who has done the hurting: the created earth and the created child of God. This is done in the community of others; we mourn not only our own death, but each face we see. While it does stir wonders of mortality, it is the promise of peace, wholeness and resolution of a loving God. It is the re-marking of new life at the annointing of baptism. The same way a newly planted tree is fertilized with the sprinkling of ashes at its roots, we are reminded of our connection, reliance and responsibility to care for God’s creation of which we are fully part.

And Easter will bring a glorious Spring….

 
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Posted by on February 25, 2009 in Uncategorized

 

Can the dark place smile?

It is parable season. We have been enjoying over the past weeks the parables of Jesus in our Godly Play classes. While the six golden boxes equally cradle these parable gifts, the parable of the Good Shepherd somehow takes a special presence in the classroom.

The presentation blends Psalm 23 and John 10. The good shepherd leads each named and known sheep from the sheepfold, to the green grass and the cool clean water. If you sit at a certain spot in the circle, it looks like there is a dark place or face with no light in the eyes and a frown. The good shepherd carefully guides the sheep through the dark places and if any go astray will go anywhere to find them and bring them back to the sheepfold for a great rejoicing. The ordinary shepherd allows the sheep to wander and when the wolf comes, the ordinary one runs away.

This simple story has led thousands of children and adults to new insight and glimpses of a divine relationship: self, others, spirit and nature. The insight in the responses never fails to surprise me as a storyteller. Lately, I’ve been intrigued by a trend about the dark place that is very telling about our culture. Over the past three or so weeks, I’ve told this story to three different groups of children in two different countries.

The first group were older elementary children, the week of the airplane crash in the Hudson River with all passengers surviving. When our circle began to wonder about the dark places, they immediately connected the dark place as being back at the cool clean water. The cool was too cold; the calm surface was hard like concrete. The dark frowning face, for them that day, was an island of safety to cling to out of the chaos of the water.

The second group of children was in Honduras a few days later. When this group of children wondered about the dark places, their experiences were different than others I’d heard. One eight-year-old boy had a story about the dark place. He had accompanied some adults to the top of the mountain with the herd of cows, when the adults suddenly had to leave and he was alone to care for this whole group of cows. He expressed fear, but also pride in overcoming his fear and taking care of the herd.

The third group of children were three large classes of four and five-year-year olds. When these children wondered about the dark places, they had been afraid, but like the first group, not from primary experiences. No straying off a trail at the park, no slipping into the creek. Their fears were of movies they had seen and haunted houses they had been to at Halloween.

I wonder what this could really mean? I wonder if our children are robbed of the adventure and growth of the dark place, by our safe, sanitized culture. Joining the false security we wrap our children in, we allow them access to terrifying information (out of their control) in the guise of them knowing about their world.

It is hard to let them go off the trail, out of our grasp. I certainly don’t want children to be in real danger, but maybe enough to overcome some authentic obstacles and grow from it. I like the idea of the dark place being the quiet satisfied smile when the child grows from it, coming back to the shepfold with stories of appropriate adventure. Does the truly dangerous, dark places our adolescent children encounter come from a deep place of needing adventure or some self-discovery? Often times that dark place smiles, too, but in a sinister and inviting way.

Something to wonder about, to be sure. While I don’t think I’ll be leaving my seven-year-old on a hilltop with the herd of cows anytime soon, I might encourage the dark places to smile a bit.

 
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Posted by on February 18, 2009 in Uncategorized