This morning I’m delighted to introduce you to Andrea who blogs at Goldfish Crumbs Under the Table. And her ETSY shop is here. If you want to get hooked on Catechesis and see what it can look like at home, you’ll want to bookmark her page. Plus, her babies have the most amazing cheeks ever.
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So there I was going through Lent, trying to cultivate a heart of Joyfulness. I know, it’s kind of a weird Lenten discipline, but it’s really something that I need to work on. Anyways, I got an order from my Etsy shop for my Cenacle peg people set. It is always a nice surprise to find that someone likes your work enough to pay for it. So far I have been making each order as I receive it. I’ve discovered that maybe I need to change the way I do it and have some ready in advance because I tend to spend lent and advent working on figures instead of spending time teaching my own children about these special times of year.
The Cenacle Set
I really enjoy making the sets though, they are dear to me because they are tied up with fond memories of when I first discovered the Catechesis of the Good Shepherd. I learned about the philosopy behind it through reading “The Religious Potential of the Child” by Sophia Cavalletti, and then teaching a class at the Anglican Church of the Good Shepherd and discovering first hand that children indeed do have far more “religious” potential than we give them credit for. For those unfamiliar with this method, it borrows a bit from the Montessori Method as Montessori and Cavalletti were contemporaries. There are times during a typical lesson for singing, prayer, and preparing the altar, as well as taking responsibility for caring for the space. While all of these aspects bring great depth to the experience of the child, the main part of the lesson involves reading a bit of actual scripture, and using physical manipulatives to act out the lesson. First the catechist reads the scripture alone, then again while she shows the children how to act out the story and then a third time while allowing the children to act out the story. This is followed by “wondering questions,” something like “I wonder how Mary felt when she saw the Angel?” I am always amazed whenever I give a lesson. The physical acting out of the story with little hands really helps little hearts ponder the scriptures and cement the stories and deeply profound truths into their little hearts, much beyond what I had previously suspected. I have heard four year olds debate the nature of the resurrection, ponder the how Jesus is the light, and connect the Good Shepherd to the Father. When you are sitting there with the children and quietly witnessing these conversations, it literally feels like magic. How are such young children able to have such depth in their understanding of scripture? Of course it is not “magic”, but it is supernatural. I have witnessed the Holy Spirit working in the heart of another person. The Holy Spirit knows no age. God sees each person as an eternal creature, outside of time, and as such, they have just as much potential to know God as an adult. God is not restricted by age, he can reveal himself to anyone at any point in their life. If even the trees and animals can worship God as we see in the Psalms how much more so a little human being made in the very image of God?
Working with the Cenacle
Sorry. I got a little carried away. I just get a bit passionate about children and God. So. I do not formally teach Catechesis of the Good Shepherd anymore, because, sadly we had to leave our Church of the Good Shepherd behind when we moved out of state. How I wish I could have just packed the entire church in the moving truck and brought it (them) with me. Well, I know that’s silly, but I did bring a tiny part of it with me. I continue to teach the lessons at home to my daughter who is currently four. Of course, I have had to make all the materials as it is a materials intensive method of teaching. It’s a good thing I went to school for four years to get a Bachelor’s of Fine Arts. See? I knew that degree would come in handy. If only my liberal minded professors knew what I was doing with my degree. Ha! Anyways, I have been working in all my spare time between moving to a new state, having two children, and getting a new house to make catechesis materials for my daughter. And upon the encouragement of friends and family have consequently begun to make and sell them at my Etsy shop, for others to enjoy. So this Easter I was working on Making the set for the Empty Tomb. I do not have the wood working skills or tools to make the set like the traditional one used in Atriums, but I worked out another way to make the set. I used a plain wooden box and decorated the inside to look like the setting for the Tomb.
The Empty Tomb
As I presented the materials to my daughter, she anxiously watched and waited for her turn to touch the materials. She acted out the story with the peg people as I read the scriptures again. And then she had some free time to work with the materials on her own. As she worked, I asked some wondering questions, and after I was done I just sat quietly and watched. In one version of her “play” she had Jesus leave the tomb and stand on the rock and gather his friends (the women who came to the tomb). Then the guards came over to them and apologized to Jesus for being mean and everyone followed Jesus up the mountain. I can’t help but think of prophecies of the redeemed world going up to the mountain of Jerusalem to worship Jesus, which is amazing since I haven’t taught her those scriptures yet. I also see a working out of the salvation process as the guards ask for forgiveness and then proceed to physically follow Jesus. She always strays from the text a bit, but for the most part everything stays very theologically sound, and when it doesn’t I may begin to intervene a bit. But when I am quiet and let the Holy Spirit do his work, I see some of the most beautiful parallels come out of her play. In another version, the Angel, and the women were in the tomb with Jesus, and Jesus lead them all out of the tomb and cleared the guards out of the way to lead them all safely up the mountain again. In a similar way Jesus is the first fruits coming out of the tomb and leads all the rest in his kingdom out of death and up the mountain to worship God in Joy. It really is truly astounding to me.
I think some of the “magic” comes from the teacher letting go of some control of directing and instructing every moment that the child is with them. This is why it is important to prepare the environment in advance, as well as the materials. Then, you lay out the seeds of scripture, and sit back and watch what the Holy Spirit does with the seeds you have scattered. Too often we seek to control every aspect of the world around us. I say “we” as in modern society, but my main evidence for this statement comes from observing my own tendencies. And God tells us this is futile, “a striving after the wind,” because, honestly what power do we have? We are utterly helpless and naked without God. We are powerless to control the events of our life, much less to control the hearts of other people. I wonder how much more peace I would have in my life if I humbly followed God and sprinkled scripture throughout my life and then left it alone and let God work on running the world. Really he is probably much better at it than I am anyways. And so I have come full circle back to my efforts to cultivate Joyfulness, because there is no surer way to suck the Joy out of your life than to try to pretend you are God and that you can control everything. I used to think that Joyfulness was a feeling that if I just prayed hard enough God would just give it to me as a gift. And surely there are some Christians who are just given the gift of Joy. I can think of several people who I have met that it just seems to come naturally to. But for those of us who do not have a supernatural gift for it, I think that it comes more from how we choose to spend our time rather than just trying really hard to gin up a feeling of thankfulness, or contentment to get joy. Instead of just thinking with my mind, “I am thankful for my husband, my children, my home etc.” and then waiting for a feeling of joyfulness, I need to make those thoughts a reality by intentionally choosing to spend time enjoying them. That means, for me anyways, choosing to spend time with the people I love, doing the activities that we enjoy. And on the flip-side it means avoiding things that stress me out unnecessarily or stir up feelings of dis-contentedness. I think I am a bit too future minded and sometimes I fill my life with busyness striving after the next thing, what I want my house to look like, what I want my children to be like, what project I will do next. Maybe if I slowed down and laid out the seeds of scripture in my life and then just sit and enjoy what I have in the present and let God take care of the future. Like in the atrium, I need to Let Go of feeling like I need to be constantly busy constructing my future and just maybe I can sit back let the Holy Spirit work in my life.
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