Joy is not a feeling one often associates with Ash Wednesday. Despite this, I cannot help but feel joyful when I reflect on the last one that I spent with my family, just before the realities of the pandemic set in. I slipped away from my office to attend a midday Ash Wednesday service at my parish in Lancaster, PA, and returned later in the evening with my three boys for the Family Ash Wednesday Eucharist. Rather than being held in the sanctuary, this service was to take place in the chapel. 

The space is small and beautiful in its simplicity. It serves as a favorite spot for me when I have a small break at work to take a short walk to the chapel, finding a few moments for quiet prayer and meditation. However, the scene on this Ash Wednesday was quite different from those times I sought this space for a bit of quiet. It was instead bursting at the seams, shoulder to shoulder with people, young and old alike. I settled in with my children, but it wasn’t long before Oliver, three years old at the time, was holding court down the center aisle. My middle child, Emerson, decided to move to the front of the chapel and lean on the altar rail, contorting his body in a way that only a six year old can. And my oldest, Liam, was asked to help prepare the table with our parish priest. Liam, who was looking forward reaching the fourth grade so he could become an acolyte, beamed with pride. 

It was all beautifully chaotic.  This, I thought, is what I imagined for my children when I thought about bringing them to church each Sunday. A place that was full of life and love, where they could explore and wonder while participating in the life and sacraments of the Church. What I did not know at that time was that in a few short weeks the physical space of the Church would need to close its doors to help protect against the spread of a deadly pandemic. The College where I worked and taught would send students home early. Schools would move to online learning. And my family would find ourselves lounging comfortably in pajamas, watching a live-streamed Mass with the assumption that we’d probably be back in Liam’s favorite pew by Holy Week. 

Needless to say, we weren’t back in that pew by Holy Week. The reality set in that we wouldn’t be returning to that pew anytime soon, and I began to consider how my role and the role of my wife might adapt concerning the spiritual formation of our children. How might we create a sense of the sacred when there were no aisles to run down, altar rails to contort on, or tables to prepare? I’ve always considered the role of parents and caregivers paramount when it comes to the spiritual formation of children, but also imagine that role in partnership with a loving parish community, committed to helping children plant seeds of faith that both family and church can water, tend, and watch break through the soil. 

As families adapted, our church adapted too. Being nimble and creative, they found new ways to keep the children of the parish engaged with one another, with the Church, and with the sacred stories that teach them about their faith and the world. However, we made efforts at home to further cultivate our children’s spiritual imaginations. There are stories that come to mind, gifts that we’ve received, and lessons that have been learned that will carry on well beyond this pandemic. 

To create structure for the boys while at home for school, we have “morning meeting” each weekday. We discuss the weather and their schedule for the day. We might read a book or watch a video related to something they are learning. And we open the Book of Common Prayer to page 137 and pray the “Daily Devotions for Families and Individuals.” Admittedly, I often have to call them back into the room for this short time of prayer before they escape at the end of morning meeting, but they generally oblige, find a place to sit, and pray. 

As we read from Psalm 51 one morning, Liam stopped me mid-sentence. “Wait, Dad!” I looked up. “Create in me a clean heart. That’s like asking for forgiveness, right? Well, I was kind of mean to my brother earlier, so I just wanted to say that I’m sorry.” 

They are listening! I still smile thinking about this simple reflection. In our daily prayer, I’ve always asked them to pay attention, because prayer has a way of weaving its way into our hearts if we let it. What might carry little meaning for them one day bursts with meaning the next. And here was Liam, whether or not he knew it, taking a little piece of that lesson to heart. 

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The doors to our church may be closed, but the gates to the church yard are typically open throughout the day. “Church walks” have become a regular feature of our life at home. The boys spend time roaming the church yard among the gravestones of those who fought in the American Revolution, the outdoor fountain situated at the center of a small courtyard, the trees that provide shade, and the garden in the far corner of the church yard.

We were regulars in this space, and especially in the garden. In summers past, the children of our parish helped plant, weed, and harvest in the garden while spending time listening to stories, praying, and engaging in short contemplative practices, but this past summer was obviously different. A few families agreed to tend the garden during the pandemic, and we were one of them. We took this role to heart. The boys planted vegetables and watched them grow, got dirt under their fingernails while pulling weeds, and were excited to collect the harvest and deliver it to the local food bank. It was sacred work in a space we found sacred. The dirt of the garden felt like what Mircea Eliade describes as an hierophany, a breakthrough of the sacred into everyday human experience. 

One morning in the church yard, Emerson was climbing a tree while Liam was sitting on a blanket in the grass near the garden, completing school work. I was sitting on a nearby bench when Oliver approached me with a question. “Is Jesus (pronounced Jee-us) alive?” Is Jesus alive? I’m not sure what inspired this question, but it was one that could not be brushed aside. 

“What do you think?” I asked. 

“Jesus is in Heaven,” he responded. 

“Yes, and in here. In your heart.” I pointed to his chest. 

“Jesus in my heart?” he exclaimed, eyes widening. Suddenly, he threw his hands in the air. “Jesus is in my heart!” he said again, louder and exuberant, before running off toward the fountain. Another small revelation. A small gift. 

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Emerson loves to read a story from the Bible or learn about a saint before bedtime. Sometimes I wonder if this is also a stall tactic to stay awake just a bit longer, but more often he seems genuinely engaged and curious about the stories we read. One night not long ago he was neck deep in the bathtub, bubbles up to his cheeks. It was almost time to dry off and put on pajamas for the night. But what he did instead surprised me. He ducked his head under the water and quickly came up with water dripping down his face into his eyes. “Towel please!” he exclaimed. After wiping away the water from his face, he looked at me with a wry smile. “I can’t believe you were baptized in a pool!” he shouted while on the verge of laughter. I had told him before about my own baptism and about the church I grew up in where “believer baptism” was the practice. 

“Dad, if I have a baby, I want a priest to come to the hospital right away. My baby is getting baptized when it is zero days old.” Before I could ask him why this was so important to him, he answered my question for me. “I want them to know right away that Jesus loves them.” I could have cried right then and there, but he wasn’t finished with his theological reflections. The bath water and bubbles he was surrounded by must have been inspiring him. 

“Dad, I can’t believe God was stinky. Can you believe that God was stinky?”

I was confused. He just laughed. I asked him why God was stinky. “Well, Jesus was God but also a person. A person like you and me who walked around. Dad, he even died! I’m sure he must have been stinky too. I bet he needed to take a bath. And he was probably stinky when he was on the cross…”

I can’t remember at age six reflecting on the nature of Christ’s humanity and divinity. Yet somehow, in this bathwater, here was my son doing just that. Another gift. 

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I’m not sure when our family will be back in Liam’s favorite pew. I’m not sure when I’ll get to see Liam process to the front of the church as an acolyte or watch Oliver run down the center aisle at an inopportune moment or listen to Emerson reflect on his experience of receiving communion as we walk back to our seat from the altar. But I have learned that our children continue to ask questions, to wonder, and grow. I’ve learned that helping them along in their own spiritual formation isn’t something that we do apart from everyday living, but instead is the essence of our everyday living. I would be remiss if I didn’t admit that oftentimes I wonder if anything is getting through to them. I can’t help but think about lighting our first Advent candle this past year, trying to share a prayer while Oliver stood dancing on the table. Meanwhile Liam and Emerson fought loudly over who would light the candle. Yet with persistence and patience, and with making time for wondering and noticing, the small gifts emerge. We will continue gardening, praying, and reading stories. We will continue lighting candles and dancing on tables. We will continue sharing the lives of the saints, even if it’s only to delay sleep for a little while longer. And my prayer is that living life in such a way, accepting the small gifts as they come, will continue to form my children and my family, opening their minds fully to the light and love of Christ