Gathered Together
Annual Wild Goose Dispatches & More
Dear Friends,
I’m back! Okay, I wasn’t gone long, but I am a day late as I continue to get my bearings following the Wild Goose Festival 2024 (and my subsequent brief annual visit to my parents/grandmother/sisters). Together, it’s a whirlwind week of travel, but a very special one.
So, what did the Goose bring this year?
First of all, the best moniker: as I was setting up Godly Play response materials on opening afternoon and getting registration information from families, another returning team member caught wind from the children that they remembered me from the last year or two – the lady with the round glasses who tells us stories. What more could I ever want to be!
Another gift of the Goose that I think is easily overlooked if you’re not someone who comes into relationship with children easily, and that is the wonder of watching these small humans who you get to be with really for only a few hours a year, grow up into incredible and less-small humans. The child who carefully decoded a picture book with another young camper last year read to me easily from a chapter book this year. Children who weren’t old enough to be in the main tent last year joined the circle. I remembered a preschooler’s summer birthday from last year and the sewing projects a group of cousins devoted themselves to and asked after children with parents I saw around site who had arrived solo this year.
Our team grew and shifted, getting to know colleagues in our dispersed trainer network, learning from them as always and delighting in their particular gifts. And I got to celebrate that they were coming to know the wonder of this place – and want to come back and continue being a part of that.
Bonus: the weather was better this year – last year’s merciless heat followed by an enormous storm was replaced by (relatively) cool breezes and a bit of light rain on our first full day and a warmer but not terrible second day. July in North Carolina is no joke, but I saw way more interesting bugs than I got bug bites and kept cover under our main tent with its great shade and fans.
I could go on. It was a little miraculous to do the physical labor of being at the Goose following my spine surgery in January – it’s so much more manageable and less painful. It’s also hard to explain how this place that really serves a community beyond my usual needs or desires forms a really central piece of my life each year. But maybe this week’s Gospel can help.
Gather Up The Fragments
Amidst all the gifts of the Goose and my time away, I will say it felt strange not to be writing here as the events of the days sped past with great drama. I learned about the assassination attempt against Donald Trump via text message as I trotted off to read bedtime stories on our patio tent. A few days after I got home, the entire internet crashed, shutting down major global networks. Then President Biden announced he would not be seeking reelection.
I had barely gotten my brain back in order from my whirlwind of over-socializing with three flights in a week and our unprecedented times were really operating at full capacity. What even is there to say – except that all of these events point to moments of community experience and convergence, whatever one’s beliefs and positions. We were all experiencing “where were you when you heard” types of moments.
I imagine for Jesus’s contemporaries, there were a lot of these “where were you when you heard” moments. And that there were even more “ you had to be there” moments, like this week’s Gospel, which is John’s account of the Feeding of the 5000. It was miraculous to stretch the food, but perhaps even more so to have witnessed the gathering up of the fragments following the meal, fragments that had multiplied so far beyond the original supply.
Big, collective experiences can bring people together, but there’s are always some among us who feel like the fragments, shut out from all of it. And who will gather us in? Where are we in the story?
In reading this passage, I am brought back to the Goose. If anyplace has ever tried to gather up the pieces left behind after the great meal, I think that may be the place. I may not need to be gathered up in this way, but some of us are also needed to help with the gathering. And I am so glad I can offer up my hands to do so.
What do you need right now? Are you the gatherer or the gathered? Are there places you wish you could be drawn back in, rather than left behind like a worthless crumb? What would make you feel held in that way?
Resource Round-Up
A quick round-up as I get back into the swing of things!
I’m excited to dig in on theologian Kaitlin Schiess’s new podcast Curiously, Kaitlin from Holy Post. She’s got a great lineup of knowledgeable guests looking at really important questions straight out every Sunday School teachers’ nightmares! From How Is God Everywhere, and Why Can’t We See Him? to Why Did God Send the Flood? and Is God a Boy or a Girl? – there’s a lot to think about here.
As you’re working on program year planning, have you considered or reevaluated how children are included in corporate worship and how you engage in sending practices? I love this article from Refocus Ministry on eliminating phrases like “the children are dismissed” and other practices that sow intergenerational division instead of connection.
I think a lot of us are acutely aware of the need to support parents and caregivers in navigating a landscape that makes raising children complicated in new ways relative to previous generations, but I also think we underestimate our ability to directly support young people. That’s why I was pleasantly surprised by this sheet from the Presbyterian Mission on helping youth take control of their schedules. It points not just to typical questions of setting priorities but also about being intentional about technology use, ensuring they take sabbath time, and engaging in self care and time with family. I’ll definitely pull this out in September for my parish’s Youth Ministry Summit!
(And if you’re trying to reinvigorate youth programming, especially if you’re in the northeast, email me about the summit model! I’d love to work with you on renewing your youth ministry programming in ways led by your young people.)I got to read some great new books from Flyaway Books while at the Goose! You can even find me on their social media telling bedtime stories. (Look, it’s still really bright at 7pm in July!)
Unsurprisingly, Amy-Jill Levine & Sandy Eisenberg Sasso’s latest collaboration, “A Very Big Problem,” is fantastic and deserves a place on your shelf alongside your creation story materials, while “I’m Fabulous Crab” and “Apple and Magnolia” are charming stories suitable for any setting, exploring unusual friendships and acts of care.
The kids even helped make Fabulous Crab extra fabulous with this art installation at the Goose!
Next week we’ll be back to the usual Tuesday routine! Til then –
Peace,
Bird