Tent Strings

I think the way I’m going to handle these particular comments is to pick one point from each speaker (from the book) that seems particularly relevant to what we’re doing. I get to share, and hopefully won’t ramble. All of these speakers have interesting things to say. It will also keep me from quoting more words than I’m legally allowed to. I’m not sure what the limit is.

Marcia Bunge, a contributor to Children’s Spirituality is editor of The Child in Christian Thought(Eerdmans, 2001) among other credits. After opening with ways that the church and our culture lack commitment to children, she targets 5 seemingly conflicting positions regarding children as revealed in the scriptures and in Christian tradition. She says, "Although theologians within the Christian tradition have often expressed narrow and even destructive depictions of children and childhood, there are 6 central ways of speaking about the nature of children within Christian tradition that when critically retrieved and held in tension- can broaden the conception of children and strengthen our commitment to them. Her point, I believe, is that as we understand children, all of these are important considerations.

The 5 elements:

1) Children are a gift from God- a joy and a blessing, to their families and their community.

2) We've all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. We're born into an imperfect world. From childhood, we're prone to act in self-centered and selfish ways.

3) Children are still growing and developing. They need to be trained. Biblically, parents are a primary agent for this, but families are part of communities. Children were present in community gatherings for the reading of the Word.

4) Children are fully human, made in the image of God and deserve respect.

5) Jesus held them up as examples. To welcome a child is to welcome Christ Jesus. There are things that God wants to show us through children.

6) Orphans, the fatherless, the poor deserve justice and compassion.

We all wrestle with seemingly contradictory statements in scripture but after having read what she had to say, the picture I left with was a tent. We need the center standards to keep it upright. We need ropes pulling in at least four opposing directions to keep it stable. If all the peg ropes pull in the same direction the tent will lean and fall over. As people working with children, we need to identify the ropes and have all of them pulling equally taut to keep the tent from falling over. If you've set up a tent before, you 're welcome to ponder the details and draw your own analogies!