Today is halfway between Palm Sunday and Easter Sunday. It’s also Spring Break for my grandchildren -- five extra days off school, plus the Easter weekend.
Most of the year, parents have their children’s after-school free time fully organized. Soccer practice, perhaps. Or swimming. Music lessons. Boys and girls club. Gym classes. Ballet. Whatever it is, it keeps the kids occupied, with some kind of adult supervision, until the parents get home from work.
Spring Break upsets the schedule.
So what do you do? You can’t just let them play unsupervised, can you? From a safety perspective, of course not.
But Peter Gray, a psychologist and research professor at Boston College in Massachusetts, suggests that unsupervised play might be children’s most valuable learning time.

Learning time
Children at play, he argues, are not just playing. They’re learning how to regulate themselves.
“The reason play is such a powerful way to impart social skills,” Gray wrote in an article for Aeon Magazine, “is that it is voluntary. Players are always free to quit, and if they are unhappy they will quit. So the goal, for every player who wants to keep the game going, is to satisfy his or her own needs and desires while also satisfying those of the other players.
“Social play involves lots of negotiation and compromise.
“Preschoolers playing a game of ‘house’ spend more time figuring out how to play than actually playing. Everything has to be negotiated -- who gets to be the mommy, who gets to use which props …
“Or watch an age-mixed group of children playing a ‘pickup’ game of baseball. A pickup game is directed by the players themselves, not by outside authorities (coaches and umpires) as a Little League game would be. The players have to choose sides, negotiate rules to fit the conditions, decide what's fair and foul. They have to co-operate not just with the players on their team, but also with those on the other team…”
Yes, kids get angry sometimes. But, says Gray, “Children who want to continue playing know they have to control that anger, use it constructively and not lash out. Tantrums might work with parents, but they never work with playmates.”

Different rules
The lessons learned in childhood play, Gray suggests, will later influence how we handle our marriages, our work, even our worship preferences.
The proximity of Easter makes me wonder what kind of games Jesus played as a child. I’m fairly sure he didn’t play Little League baseball. Not just because baseball hadn’t been invented yet. But because Peter Gray used Little League as an example of structured play, where a distant authority defines the rules; coaches and umpires enforce them.
Jesus’ later life persuades me that most of his games were unstructured, whatever they were. Whenever external authorities -- the Pharisees, the High Priests, the Romans -- tried to make him play by their rules, he did things differently. He adapted. He compromised. He tried to keep all the players in the game.
And the umpires and coaches didn’t like it. You can’t have a player who doesn’t play by the rules, can you?
So they crucified him.
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Copyright © 2016 by Jim Taylor. Non-profit use in congregations and study groups, and links from other blogs, welcomed; all other rights reserved.
        To comment on this column, write jimt@quixotic.ca
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YOUR TURN

Lloyd MacLean, pianist for the Common Cup Company since Jim Urich’s death, sent this message: Thank you for your beautifully written epitaph for our friend, colleague, and musical brother Ian. You may know that the remaining members of Common Cup shared in the presentation of the music at Ian's funeral last week with his three sons -- Jamie, Rory and Derek. I would say that 95% of the music we played was written or co-written by Ian. It was a beautiful service.”

Not long after, this letter came from Gordon Light, Ian Macdonald’s writing partner: “Lloyd forwarded your wonderful words celebrating Ian. Thanks so much. Barbara (Gordon’s wife )and I had lunch with Rory (Ian’s son)today and he was greatly appreciative of the epitaph. It is amazing to think he has gone, but he has left us so full. So full of music, so full of laughter, so full of God. I feel so grateful to have shared a wonderful friendship, and a great partner in song.”

Dale Perkins also attended Ian’s memorial service: “You certainly captured Ian again for me. I attended the memorial for Ian at South Burnaby -- hundreds there. Met Bob Wallace afterwards and we commiserated. Found the service haunting and sweet -- Bob Haverluck reflected on times with Ian there in Winnipeg, anchored my impression there really was a Winnipeg ecclesiastical mafia there at that time.
“I was the desk-mate with Fred McNally those years in DMC (but didn't remember Ian expanding Fred's domain into my turf.)
“A great story (think Bob H told it) of when he and Ian were taking a course in mental hospital in North (or South) Dakota. There was a catatonic schizophrenia patient in facility who hadn't talked for long time. Ian was seen engaging the woman and finally able to get her talking. They got into a long conversation. The next day the head of psychiatry met them and said whatever Ian had done he should bottle it. He also told them the woman had climbed the wall that night surrounding the institution and escaped. And she still is out there somewhere, not found -- "Escape a la Macdonald!!” 
“I noticed people near me, obviously members of South Burnaby. who were deeply touched by memories of Ian,  especially the men, openly crying. An amazing life.”

Another letter came from celebrated composer Ron Klusmeier: “A friend (Gwen Boyd) shared your piece on Ian. What a masterful job you’ve done in capturing a glimpse of his life and spirit. I was profoundly touched by Ian's passing and deeply moved by your writing. The grief and irony of losing a kindred spirit and friend who lived for words — and who, in the end, lived in the cruel agony of being unable to find them — is softened just a tad by your sharing.
“Ian and I shared many meetings, songs, and beers over the decades. I will never, ever forget his introductory line to me. It was pure Macdonald. Kris and I were leading music for a Winnipeg Presbytery UCC 50th anniversary celebration in the Centennial Auditorium. You may recall that I was pretty shaggy-looking at the time. A slightly crazed (and equally hairy) stranger stood before me backstage and said ‘Wow!’ Assuming it was a compliment about the music, I said ‘Thank you.’ He looked me right in the eye and then swung his body around in Kris’s direction. Ian turned back to me and again said ‘Wow!’ But this time he added, ‘How the (bleep) did an ugly piano player like you score a babe like that?!!’ And then, ‘Hi, my name’s Ian.’”

Ian’s death left a lot of people with a sense of loss. Jayne Whyte wrote, “With tears in my eyes, I bless Ian as he leaves us on ‘this spinning blue planet.’ Thank you for your tribute.”

Bonita Garrett, Steph Wakelin, Isabel Gibson, and Tom Watson sent notes of appreciation.

Margaret Carr wrote, “I did not know there was a song about The Bugs and the Dragonflies. I do know the book and have used it many times to explain death to children in the loss of someone dear to them. I would love to know where I could find the song.”
It’s on the Common Cup Company’s website, <http://www.commoncup.com/>, then click on their Store, and then on the Album "Outside the Lines." You can order either that individual song, or the whole album.

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PSALM PARAPHRASES

The lectionary suggests new fewer than eight different psalms for Easter Sunday. So I had to make a choice. I decided that Psalm 46 (as paraphrased) best fitted the times we live in.

1   Wars and rumors of wars swirl around us;
corporate strife and struggle engulf us.
Only God stands firm in these shifting sands.
God is our shelter from them; 
God gives us strength to go out into the stresses of each day.
2   We have nothing to fear. 
Though the social order is shaken, 
though our leaders come crashing down,
3   though long-honored standards fly at half-mast
and the values we inherited are scorned -- 
even then, we have nothing to fear.

4   The comforting presence of God pours over us 
like cool water on a burning beach; 
it makes us glad.
5   God is with us; 
God is an oasis of peace upon a darkling plain
6   where ignorant armies clash by night. 
The ambitious leap over each other; 
The emperor stands naked in the cold clear light of innocence. 
They are frozen in their folly.
7   But God is with us; 
God is our sanctuary.

8   See how wonderfully the Lord works! 
Those who would beat others have beaten themselves;
9   Those obsessed with winning wind up as losers; 
Those who think only of themselves find that no one thinks of them at all. 
All their struggles add up to nothing.
10   This is God's word to the warring: "Be still! 
Be still, and know that I -- and only I -- am God!"

11   In the tumult of the nations, 
in the torment of the earth, 
God is with us. 
God is our sanctuary. 
Thanks be to God.

For paraphrases of most of the psalms used by the Revised Common Lectionary, you can order my book Everyday Psalms from Wood Lake Publishing, info@woodlake.com.

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YOU SCRATCH MY BACK…
Ralph Milton has a new project, called Sing Hallelujah – the world’s first video hymnal. It consists of 100 popular hymns, both new and old, on five DVDs that can be played using a standard DVD player and TV screen, for use in congregations who lack skilled musicians to play piano or organ. More details at www.singhallelujah.ca
Isabel Gibson's thoughtful and well-written blog, www.traditionaliconoclast.com
Alan Reynold's weekly musings, punningly titled “Reynolds Rap,” write reynoldsrap@shaw.ca
Wayne Irwin's "Churchweb Canada," an inexpensive service for any congregation wanting to develop a web presence, with free consultation. <http://www.churchwebcanada.ca>
Alva Wood's satiric stories about incompetent bureaucrats and prejudiced attitudes in a small town are not particularly religious, but they are fun; write alvawood@gmail.com to get onto her mailing list.
Tom Watson writes a weekly blog called “The View from Grandpa Tom’s Balcony” – ruminations on various subjects, and feedback from Tom’s readers. Write him at twatson@sentex.net

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TECHNICAL STUFF

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