On New Year Eve, I had the privilege of being a friendly adult presence for a sleepover at our Meeting House.
The group consisted of 8 middle school kids from our First Day School, including my son. There were 5 boys and 3 girls, all between the ages of 11 and 14. The kids enjoyed the snacks; we ordered pizza, took down the Meeting House tree and had several pillow fights. Board games were played.
What stands out most for me was the joy of the kids. We held a Meeting for Worship which lasted a half hour. We spent the half hour of silence in the dark at the middle schooler’s request. At rise of Meeting, shortly before midnight, someone passed out dozens of chemo luminescent bands that fluoresce when you bend them. These they strung together into wheels, large and small, tossing them spinning into the air. There was much laughter and it was a beautiful scene as colors spiraled through the air. The kids moved with a kind of frantic joy. I watched with great happiness what the young people were creating. I thought this was surely the Spirit at work.
Amazingly, I got some sleep that night. I figure that was the Spirit at work as well.
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2 comments:
Chuck, you are a brave, brave man.
I maintain that Quaker kids are a little more self-contained than the Unitarian and Congregationalist kids I grew up with. But I might be wrong.
Well, the kids said that as Quakers, there's this emphasis on silence, which they respect, but this was a chance to be noisy, which they obviously enjoyed
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