Telling the story - Advent day two

One of the things I love doing is going into primary schools to do assemblies and do RE in classrooms. The saddest thing about having to curtail my last appointment was giving up my chaplaincy at a Methodist school. So, it was a huge privilege this morning to be invited to our friend’s school in city centre Peterborough to do assembly and then teach a class about the nativity story. 

Assembly in Advent was all about waiting. I got the children to stand in a queue. We explored the frustration of waiting. The children then sang Go tell it on the mountain with great gusto. I then went and shared with a delightful class of children for an hour. We explored the nativity story character by character, slowly, bit by bit, sharing what we knew of the story without looking at the Bible. I struggled to explain without being too graphic why Joseph should have dumped Mary, and we had fun when I asked what giving birth in a stable might have been like for Mary. One of the children said “it would smell of pooh” surprised I agreed with him! We also were shocked how old Mary was and how far they walked with a donkey from Nazareth to Bethlehem.  The children had been on a trip to Hunstanton and found it amazing this was the distance they would have walked from the front door of the school to the sea front. 

I think we understood as we explored the story that it is one about God entering a pooh filled world. God doesn’t come to neat and clean situations but to mess and dirt and to outsiders and overlooked. Incarnation brings those who didn’t matter into the embrace of God. I love this article from a back page of a Church Times from our President of Conference:  “ I’d abolish “they” from the English language. It’s “othering” people, and that’s the beginning of dehumanising them. We’re called to love our enemies and pray for those that persecute us; so we need to acknowledge our enemies and then acknowledge our shared humanity. It’s costly, but it’s the only way to change the world.”

 

My day after school took me to visit a couple who are struggling with health problems, then sorting a funeral of a beloved lady of one of our churches who has passed away suddenly. For both situations, those who are struggling need to know a God is there in their pooh! 

We’ve had our own pooh today. Dear Meena, the biggest character of cat I’ve ever known, lost her battle to hold on to life at nearly 16. It was horrible to have her pass to cat heaven and there is a huge hole in our house tonight. She will never be forgotten. Lis especially needs comfort tonight. The poor old girl was in a dreadful state this weekend and we need to remember her in her demanding Bengal state! 

 

At the end of my RE lesson I got the children to tell the nativity story back to me. We shared the story remembering what we know of it. People have said to me in the past that children in school don’t do any Christianity. I always say come with me into schools and see. We did more theology this morning than most adults in churches could do. 

We need in bereavement and in struggle to know this story we will hear over and over this month. It isn’t just a matter of hearing it, it is taking it in and knowing it to help us get through our pooh. Isn’t that the heart of Christmas?