Reframing the Cardboard Box
Building an Atrium is expensive. There’s no doubt about it, and (I am beginning to realize) there is no way around it. I am discovering this as I do the uncomfortable work of asking for money to fund the Montpelier Atrium, and find myself encountering the various flavors of conversation that come with that. Money is complicated, and we feel that complication in so many different ways. I sympathize and relate.
Speaking of dealing with money in different ways, this whole Atrium-building work has me processing my own position on the intersection of children and money.
The things for the Atrium are admittedly very specific and, because they are meant to be valuable and natural materials, are not cheap to acquire or make. Though there is certainly an element of (and desire to) reuse and recycle, these materials often cannot be hand-me-downs or adapted to their purpose, and if they are, they still require the value of time and care to make them appropriate to the space and their use in the Atrium. (Point in case: I’ve already spent a great deal of time and materials on sanding, stripping, painting, staining, gluing, touching up, cleaning, and generally re-stabilizing free or cheaply acquired furniture for the Montpelier Atrium.)
An interesting thought occurred to me about the nature of the materials: because they are so specifically curated and crafted towards children, they are largely not of use to anyone else for anything else. There are certain sized chalices and plates and cruets and wooden structures and figures and posters and they are specially painted and formed and aren’t really good for anything but what they are made for. This intentionality communicates something that (alarmingly!) feels mostly foreign to me about how children should be valued and treated.
This intentionality in the Catechesis of the Good Shepherd program isn’t a mistake or an oversight but a feature. From the little I know of and have read by the developers of this program (Sofia and Gianna!), I suspect that this is all meant to be. Purposefully or not, the program serves as a commentary on the way we treat and value children, and how that needs to be altered. Deeper still, it serves as a commentary on how our trajectory towards the care of children has ventured so far off that which was set by the Creator, and how much we need to reset it on its intended path.
“Let the little children come to me…the Kingdom belongs to such as these…”
These words are ringing in my ears, but (of note) only in pieces, and I’m not even sure I’m quoting those pieces right. How do I not know these verses by heart? I’ve heard them often enough, but they have not yet been imprinted on me in their wholeness. We have a Word from God about the value of children that is somehow strikingly clear, yet passed by frequently. Worse–it’s been terribly muddled in the mix of consumerism and frenetic pacing that defines our cultures.
When I contemplate the things that I will give or should give to my children (and those children that come to the atrium), there’s a common anecdote that always comes back to me–I hear it often, and I’ve experienced it myself. It’s when we give gifts to our children (thoughtful, meaningful, sometimes expensive) and find that they become enamored with the packaging: namely, cardboard boxes.
When we share this common experience back and forth, I feel that we are saying to each other that kids don’t appreciate nice things and so we shouldn’t bother giving them. We look at the cardboard box and think: what a silly thing to enjoy. What a useless piece of garbage. What a value-less item. How could they want that more than the thing I’ve given them?
But what if what’s happening is not that the children are valuing the wrong thing, but that we are not seeing the cardboard box correctly. This is I think a pivotal (maybe the pivotal) thing we adults fail to realize about what children bring to the table: their unencumbered, unadulterated, unfettered access to the beauty of the world; their ability to see to the heart of things, to find essentiality. They do it with such ease, and with such open hands. They can appreciate without having to possess it. They can enjoy and marvel even without needing all mystery to be revealed and explained. Indeed, they can actually, deeply love a mystery that stays a mystery (try doing that as an adult!).
What are our reasons not to give kids valuable and fragile things? Our reasons not to invest resources into them? The ones that come immediately to me are: They can’t appreciate it. They don’t know how to care for it. They will break it. They can’t replace it when they break it.
Well, I’ve already wondered through that first thought—regarding what is actually valuable and how that differs in the age gap. What about the rest? Seems logical enough reason to give them cheap and/or easily replaceable things.
It’s true that children don’t seem to be able to appreciate or care for items, but how much of this is their fault? In general, human care for things relates to how much we value said thing. It seems to me that we are caught up in a self-destructive cycle where we invest in less valuable things in order to self-protect, but we don’t care very much for that thing (internally or eternally) because we have the option of just throwing it away; ultimately, our lack of care leads to the thing needing to be discarded after all, so we get rid of it and start the cycle over again. If children see us adults doing this over and over again, it follows that their carelessness is simply a mirroring of how they perceive that things are meant to work.
Alternately, when we treat important things really preciously (meaning that we keep them inaccessible and always out of reach) again, I say: what can we truly expect from the observing child? How are they to learn how to handle something precious if the handling of that thing is only cognitive or witnessed, not physically practiced? We only know how to touch something by actually touching it and then getting feedback (was that too hard, too soft, too tight, too loose?). If we never let children handle important things, they will never learn how, nor indeed, be able to eventually take ownership of these things’ care when it is time.
The importance we personally place on material things is where our evaluation needs to start when we make decisions about what to offer to our children. We must be able to place the importance of material items below the incalculable worth of a human life and soul. Only once we have properly prioritized material things will we be able to hold them loosely enough to offer them to a child, thus allowing them the dignity and grace to learn and grow–yes, also making the mistakes necessary for that to actually happen.
So here below is some of my still-forming commitment regarding the materials of the Montpelier Atrium, in keeping with what I see in the philosophy of CGS:
The atrium will be filled with beautiful things that will be beautifully maintained.
I will not value the materials over the children.
I will re-use and recycle with the goal of valuing good, natural, quality materials.
I will always seek to be a good steward of the precious things under my care–sometimes, this will manifest in being as frugal as possible with the funds entrusted to me in being creative with where I source materials, refinishing things already made, and maintaining what we have instead of discarding. Other times, this will mean putting those funds to work as investment in the children of the atrium when buying hand crafted, new, beautiful or expensive materials.
I will model for the children proper stewardship and care, giving them the opportunity to show their ability to meet expectations, as well as increase that potential through practice. I believe this will give them precious ownership of the Atrium that will extend to other spaces in their lives and for the good of the world.
I will offer the children the dignity of valuing who they are where they are.*
In conclusion, building an atrium is expensive, and I am committed to that expense, because I believe it reflects and practices Biblical value of the child’s life (exactly where they are, not where they will be when they grow up) and is a work of teaching children their own value and how to perpetuate that value in themselves and throughout the world.
*This means many things to me.
It means following Jesus’ lead in seeing that children have a capacity that I do not–that they have many things to teach me that are intrinsic: It exists in them already. It is totally apart from me. It has great worth even if, and when, I do not understand what I am witnessing. They do not need me in order to be connected to The Good Shepherd.
This also means that I will recognize with grace the areas they have to grow–experienced when they feel out boundary lines, experiment with things, disregard guidelines, and sometimes, damage or destroy materials. These things are a part of the proess but do not define them or their place. Their particular process of learning and growing will never diminish their value or preclude them from deserving the good, beautiful, and specific experience of the CGS atrium.
The work of the Atrium is not one that happens in a vacuum. It is just a piece of the important, larger work of shepherding children that happens in a variety of environments, each dependent on the other, but more on that another time…
