Reflections from the Interim Executive Director
“Let the little children come to me, and do not stop them….” Luke 18:16, NRSV
This world can steal the joy and delight that we are born with as children. Our faith in the goodness of humankind can be readily stripped away from us.
I have always been drawn to little children and elders. In many ways they are similar; They are dependent on us to care for and protect them. They teach us to enjoy life, to remain curious and open, to see what sometimes is hidden.
My granddaughter, Aubree, who is 15 months old, is with us every Thursday. Usually by that time of the week I am feeling exhausted and drained, but then Aubree walks in, wobbling as she finds her balance, and it is like a light goes on and the world through her eyes looks and feels different. She is enthralled by everything she sees. She wants to know what is behind every cabinet door. She looks at the carpet on the floor and touches it to feel its texture. She compares that to the touch of Dommie’s tail (our cat). She goes to the window and looks out at the birds and squirrels. Everything is new and she looks at it with wide open eyes, no judgment, just curiosity.
I often wonder what it would be like if our world could return to that level of curiosity, that level of trust and faith, to that level of delight and joy, seeing in everything and everyone what the Holy and Divine sees in each of us, our goodness and potential.
Thank God for the children in our lives who transform us every time we see them, every time we see their smile, every time we hear their laughter, every time we embrace them and feel their hearts beating against ours. This is my understanding of the Holy and the Sacred.
May the joy and delight we experience and see in the children and elders in our lives call forth wonder and delight and joy in us.
“We shake with joy; we shake with grief. What a time they have, these two housed as they are in the same body.” (Mary Oliver, “We Shake with Joy”
Robin Brown-Haithco is the Interim Executive Director at ACPE. She can be reached at robin.brown-haithco@acpe.edu