I used to sell upscale toys and games at a packed shop; $100 dollar
tricycles, and Brio Trains. One of the activity kits we sold was called the
Butterfly Garden. An Ant Farm; but with
butterflies. You buy the kit and send
off a postcard; one spring we tried it.
A few days later, a small brown paper box came in the mail. It had air holes and a ‘live critters’
warning label. Inside were four or five
caterpillars. We set up the box with
clear plastic windows, and inside placed a fresh branch with green leaves and
the caterpillars. They crawled right
onto the branch and started to cocoon.
For three weeks, nothing
happened. Then all at once they began to
break out. The inside of the box was
plain white cardboard, all around each cocoon the box was splattered with a
thin red fluid. It looked bloody. It looked like a minor massacre. Customers would stop to look in at the new
butterflies. Each time they were
shocked, and amazed. ‘Its so bloody’,
they all exclaimed.
When I was 14 an MD told me there was ‘no such thing as growing pains.’ I told him, ‘that he had never been me.’ I have told that anecdote hundreds of times
and almost every teen says ‘was he nuts?’ Maybe they are not verifiable, but
growing pains are real. The bones that
burn with tension, the muscles that tingle with new life. Growing pains,
physical and emotional, are real. They
are real for children and for their parents.
One day you have a child, the next a person you have never met. Their first birthday is fresh in your mind,
and here she stands going on a first date.
Angels announce a blessed birth and the next day your boy is in the
Temple, debating with the elders. It
hurts to love like this; to love so much that the tension burns and the
stretches tingle. With an average lifespan of less than 40 in late antiquity, Jesus’ ministry from age 30 to 33 was a
retirement career. In his time the
responsibilities of adulthood began soon after the body came of age at 13 or
14. At twelve Jesus is experimenting
with being a self-sufficient adult: why were you looking for me?
We have placed a large box around the time from physical womanhood and
manhood until social adulthood. Sociologists say that the average age for the
social markers of adulthood in our culture is twenty-seven. Thirteen is the halfway mark. For a multitude of economic and social and
reasons we have fully grown men and women with virtually no responsibilities of
adulthood. Our bodies were created to do
this: to become adult men and women. It happens in its own time and rhythm, it is a gift from God and not earn-able. Adulthood is about social and
emotional maturity; Adulthood is taking responsibility for ones own life and
the lives of others. How we manage the
creative power of young men and women between physical maturity and social
maturity is one of the most troubling and amazing quandaries of our day.
In the liturgy that follows we seek to name that quandary, to name the
growing pains for children, parents and the community. In this Rite 13 we enter into this phase of
great love and great anxiety with blessing.
We remember that we are not alone, loving fully formed creatures into
fully loving adulthood. We need this;
nearly every culture has a rite of passage around the age of 13. We need to name the change; we need to remember that these young people
are brimming with creative power. We need
to speak of the love and anxiety that this change brings to the surface. And we need to pray that all creative power
will be used wisely for the common good.
The red fluid wasn’t blood. Butterflies
don’t have red blood. It was the amniotic fluid of the new birth. It took a
couple of days for butterfly’s wings to stretch, dry and harden; then we were
supposed to set the fully formed adults free.
The winds were strong and stiff.
There were airport delays for several days in a row. We didn’t want to release these new
butterflies into a whirlwind. The winds
made us anxious; it just seemed cruel.
We found a branch of freshly bloomed azaleas and even made up a little
cup of butterfly sugar water food.
However,we knew we were pushing our luck, and the winds kept on roaring.
Finally we had to set them free, or they would die in that box. So we
took the box to a protected garden at the hospital across the street. We sat the box down next to a blooming bush,
and we opened the lid. Nothing
happened. The butterflies just sat
there. Then one flew out, and the others followed. Straight up, and around, and
out into the whirlwind. They were
beautifully and wonderfully made by God to do just this. We watched, and we were amazed.
February 12, 2006
Rite-13 Liturgy; 8:45am Luke
2:41-52
St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Fayetteville, Arkansas
