A Kindergarten Prayer

My oldest daughter started kindergarten a few weeks ago, and I am consumed with anxiety and worry. I know most parents worry; but, I wasn’t prepared for the sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach as she makes her way through the snarls of school social life.  Luckily, Mandi seems to be a typically-developing 5 year-old, with the right temperament to succeed in school.  She loves to draw and practice her letters, and “reads” books (by memory).  She has an average attention span and she never wants to be in trouble (except when she’s sassy to her mom).  As far as I can tell right now, she should be able to learn in a general classroom, which is a huge relief to me, as a special education teacher.  But, I worry about her social skills.

How can she navigate the myriad social situations in a school setting?  Who does she sit with at lunch?  Can she start a conversation or begin playing with other kids?  How will she react when someone inevitably hurts her feelings?  Will she hurt someone else’s feelings?  Will she be bullied?  Will she be a bully?  Will she ever, ever make a friend?  

I try not to overwhelm her with my questions:  How was your day?  What was your favorite part?  Who played with you today?  Did you talk to anyone new?  I know better than to ask, “Did anything hurt your feelings today?”  But, inevitably, I hear the stories, “My new friend, “so and so”, said we shouldn’t be friends today.  I was really sad.  I hope we can be friends tomorrow.”  I have to turn away so she doesn’t see the tears in my eyes.  I know this is just part of growing up, that girls can be friends and not play with each other all the time, that she will have to learn how to handle these things, that I cannot protect her from hurt feelings.  Still, I want to cry.  And pray a kindergarten prayer:

Dear God,

Please help my child to be kind and help others to be kind to her. 

 Please help her to know when to speak and when to listen, when to play and when to be calm, when to go along with a friend and when to go her own way.  

Help her to be strong but not hard, confident but not arrogant, sensitive but not weak.  

 Help her to know when to forgive and when to stand up for herself and others.  

Help her to bounce back from disappointment and failure.  

Help her to learn from her mistakes.  

Help her to grow up to be loving, happy, and wise.  

Dear God, protect my baby.

Amen.

Image: "Always" by Sharon Cummings. http://fineartamerica.com/featured/always-sharon-cummings.html

Unicorns and Mystery: Thoughts on Faith

The other day, I paid $12 to pet a unicorn--twice.  At a renaissance faire with my five-year-old daughter, the sign beckoning us to “Visit the Magickal Unicorn” was impossible to resist.  My daughter, like many other five-year-old girls, loves horses, and unicorns are the coolest horses ever.  I just had to fork over the money to see the mythical beast with her.  

The unicorn was a pretty, medium sized pony mare, white (grey) in color, very well-groomed, with flowing mane and feathers on her legs.  Her ample forelock split around her horn as it cascaded over her face.  As we stood outside the stall and stroked the soft, white fur of Nikki, the magical unicorn, I asked Mandi, “Is she real?”  She replied, “No, Mom.  It’s just a horse with a horse on it.”  My daughter has been around horses her whole life, so she should be able to recognize an ordinary Welsh pony.  She also is a bit sceptical, always looking for the man behind the mask, as much as she may want to believe in magic.   Even though she saw through the disguise, she didn’t seem disappointed.  She kept looking, with a certain light in her eyes, and stroking the hair.  After we left, she told her friends all about it, and even convinced me to take her into the tent again.  (Yes, we had to pay the entrance fee a second time.  Small price for the wonder of childhood, I suppose.)

This unicorn started me thinking about faith.  My daughter knew the unicorn wasn’t REALLY a unicorn, but she was still entranced by it.  Understanding that the horn was attached by human hands didn’t kill her faith in magic; she still wishes that unicorns are real every chance she gets.   I’m so grateful for this, because it’s the wonder in her eyes that is the true magic, the possibility she sees in the flowing white mane and the soft brown eyes of the unicorn, that just might be true, somewhere.  

Please don’t mistake me.  I am not comparing faith in the God of Jesus Christ to a mystical unicorn.  I am not saying that God is magic, or that unicorns are real, or that if unicorns are not real, then neither is God.  God is real, but we cannot touch him.  We hold the tension of rational thought and mysticism in our modern minds.  If we try to find God, pin God down and exhibit the mystery, we end up with a horse with a horn attached, not a unicorn.  When we try to explain the sacred mystery of the Eucharist, we are left with a bunch of academic language, and some bread and wine.  But here is the thing:  although we know that unicorns aren’t real, we still pay $12 to touch the mystery.  Although rationally all we have in the Eucharist is some bread and some wine and some fancy words, we still touch and taste the mystery.  God is in the desire for it.  God is what makes us long for unicorns, what makes us taste the body and blood of Christ, what makes us see Jesus Christ in our fellow every-day man, what makes us love each other in the midst of the pain and heartache of this broken world.

My friends, faith does not lie in the physical object, in the things we can prove.  Faith is the desire for the mystery, the longing for the transcendent, the insistent lure of something greater, something more beautiful, something like God.   Faith is what turns the ordinary into the sacred.  Faith is when we say, “It’s only bread and wine…” but we take and eat, and take and eat, and we are transformed in spite of ourselves.