Story. Justice. Ritual. Art.
There are so many ways to explore our faith; the parts we share, and the parts that are unique to us. It’s been a tremendous blessing, these last few months, to gather with two of our adolescents and their adult mentors to look at spirituality and faith through these lenses. We call this program Confirmation, because it’s an opportunity to claim for oneself some of the ideas, questions, and practices that others may have claimed for us when we were children.
There are so many ways to come at faith questions, but to give young people (and their supportive families and mentors) a framework, I started our class by drawing some overlapping circles on the big whiteboard in the Mt. Baker Room. I invited our young people to explore faith through each of these lenses, acknowledging that they can and should overlap:
Story/Tradition: What parts of the ancient stories we gather around are resonant for you? Do you want to do a deep dive on a particular story from scripture or Christian tradition? Is there a theme you want to wrestle with that Christians (and other people of faith!) have been wrestling with already?
Justice/Service: How does your faith or spirituality call you to action? Is there some practice of love or justice you want to try out in this season? Is the Spirit inviting you to something that will require some more courage or some more community?
Ritual: It’s one thing to talk about faith, to learn about spirituality, and to understand Christian practices from an intellectual place. It’s quite another to step into them- are there ancient practices that you do regularly and want to explore more? Does your life need some more ritual in it for grounding, inspiration, encouragement, healing? If so, what might that look like: something old, something original, or something hybrid?
Art: What art inspires your faith these days? What stirs your heart, makes you angry, makes space for your grief? Taylor Swift or Michelangelo, Bach, or Fallout- it’s all art, and the Spirit can move in it. What art do you want to build a relationship with and is there an artistic practice that you’re invited to take up (or continue!) yourself?
At the center of these circles was a fifth circle called Theology: how do we talk about all of this stuff? How do we share what we are learning in our minds and hearts and bodies?
This Sunday we’ll be hearing from our two Confirmands; I’ll be talking a little bit about our process, and they’ll be sharing their “I Believe” statements. We’ll lay hands and pray for them. We’ll celebrate them moving more fully, and by their own intent, into relationship with the church. I think it’s going to be really lovely.
And.
If you have a moment this week, i want to invite you to take a look back at those areas of focus, those lenses we might bring to our faith journeys.
I want to invite you to see where these areas draw you. Is there some blank space in your life to explore a new (or old!) ritual practice? Are you stuck on that one song or movie or painting (or is there a part of you that wants to make a song or a drawing?) Does your anger invite you to some justice work, or your love invite you to some care? Is there a story in scripture or in your life that just echoes for you, that invites some more study, some conversation and reflection?
Pray on it, chat about it with your best friend and/or your dog, journal about it. It’s been so rich to explore these with our sweet middle schoolers, and there is something magic about adolescence. But there’s also something magic about who and where you are right now, and maybe the Spirit wants in!
Lemme know how it goes.
Davi
