Reading the Dry Bones

 By Kelly McWilliams

 Reading the Dry Bones

In the book of Ezekiel, the great prophet dreams of a valley of dry bones.

Dry, very dry. Old skeletons near to dust.

God asks, “Son of man, can these bones live?”

Ezekiel knows they can’t. But when God orders him to prophesy to the bones, he does as he’s told. With a great rattling and shaking the bones connect one to another. In the valley, the breath of life comes into them. They rise.

The valley of the dry bones is a metaphor for the people of Israel, who feel their faith has dried up, their hope perished. Their religion doesn’t serve them anymore. It isn’t enough. Times have changed and the old conceptions of God are dusty, useless. They have suffered enormously. In a very real way, their faith has died.

But the role of Ezekiel — of any prophet — is to breathe new life into old words. Doing so, he proves that faith isn’t a stolid, unchanging thing. It is constantly renewed. 

I wish I’d known this as a teenager, when I began to believe that Christianity was too riddled with misogyny and hate to be any kind of home. I wish I’d understood that the challenge of faith is separate from breath from dry bones, the living truth from the dust of tired old lies.

Well, I didn’t know. I sheltered in art and books (all secular), telling myself I didn’t need the faith I really craved. I wasn’t alone in this. Many of my peers in young adulthood and beyond found secular life less perilous than its alternative. Faith was conservatism, to us. Often homophobic, sexist, racist. We’d just gotten the internet and it was a brave new world. We were moving forwards. Why would we glance back at all that heaped, time-forgotten dust?

But a lack of faith can mean great loneliness. It is a painful compromise, to realize you don’t agree with what an ancient religion has come to stand for, the ways it has been twisted to oppressive ends. It took me many years to learn that you don’t have to throw out the baby with the bathwater, or the religion with its problematic expressions.  In my 20s, a period of searching, seeking roots and stable ground.  I looked to the past

I am biracial. My black ancestors found Christianity at the same time they continued to practice, and keep alive, a spiritual voodoo. My great-grandmother had second sight, but she also loved her colorful church hats, the God of her friends and neighbors. If she found contradiction in this, she learned to embrace it. To enjoy community, however imperfect, and to tweak and select snatches of faith to sew into one shimmering whole cloth.

What I wish I’d known as a teenager is this: we don’t have to accept the dry bones, because we all possess the breath of life. We are the makers of our faith, and faith itself exists to be reinterpreted, resurrected, and reformed. In that way, it’s like any old story. It is fashioned of enduring archetypes — another kind of skeleton — so that it can be revived, again and again, in new incarnations

I recently completed a young adult book, called Agnes at the End of the World (coming out in Summer 2020), about a girl struggling to find and nurture the seed of truth she has always sensed exists inside her oppressive faith. The fundamentalist cult in which she was raised is a crystallization, for me, of all that is hateful about historical Christian practices: crushing misogyny, and a doctrine of rigid, self-righteous exclusion. And yet — and yet! — she has the Bible to read, and a mind of her own with which to interpret it. She will rescue the loving God that calls to her, and leave the rest.

Her journey represents a spiritual rite of passage I don’t often see reflected in young adult literature. Yet teenagers naturally grow up to find fault with the systems that have raised them. Yes, there are hateful aspects in any religion, but that doesn’t mean the only answer is to throw the whole thing out. You can find the beauty buried in dust, and bring it to life in whatever way makes life meaningful — and indeed, worthwhile — for you.

Writing about faith re-illuminated for me the beauty I’ve always craved from religion, and the complexities, too. But the truth is, I haven’t settled on a church for my family, which now contains two adults and one impressionable two-year old. We recently embarked on a church exploratory campaign, in which we attend a different house of worship every Sunday. (It helps that we live in Colorado Springs, where there is a church per block — no exaggeration.) We haven’t settled on one yet, but I remain hopeful. 

It’s the work of a lifetime, and I can’t wait to see how my daughter’s generation will reimagine the most ancient of stories. I like to think that one day soon we will see more congregations that entirely reject every trace of misogyny, racism, and homophobia — the very social ills that push away so many. I like to dream that in this way, faith comes roaring back to life. 

A note about Kelly McWilliams 

by Padma Venkatraman 

I first came across Kelly McWilliams's work when I was judging the mentoring contest for We Need Diverse Books. She was one of the wonderfully talented authors whose work I loved but whom I didn't end up mentoring officially, because I created a short list of 5 whose works I loved and then I picked the "winning" name out of a hat - they were all that good and I wanted to mentor them all. 

I did end up writing to the other four to let them know how much I wanted to support them as well, in whatever way I could. One of the four I reached out to didn't bother to respond; the others were delighted I'd taken the time to write and let them know I was there for them (which wasn't expected of us, of course). Kelly was one of those talented others.

Since that time, we've stayed in touch, and it was my pleasure to write in support of a writing residency application for her a few years back. And now, I'm delighted to be able to showcase her essay. 

Ending this summer of SAILing into unknown waters with the work of an up and coming author is, I think, most fitting. Because, after all, this summer I've been privileged to share the work of brilliant authors who have bravely shared their views on faith. And I have faith in Kelly, and I look forward to seeing her books on the shelf, someday soon. So here's to the future.

For those of your interested in this topic, I pitched a panel idea (vetted and submitted by Sarah Aronson who also identified a moderator, Aliza Werner) that NCTE accepted this fall - and I'll be speaking together with authors Sarah Aronson, Aisha Saeed, Christine Hepperman, Megan Atwood and Aliza Werner on this topic. The panel is Sat 23 Nov 2:45-4:00 p.m. Location 326 and it's called: Sparking Thought without Starting an Inferno: Daring to Explore Potentially Explosive Questions of Faith, Spirituality, Religious Tradition, and Philosophical Diversity in Books for Young People. 

Or, if you'll be at AWP in Spring 2020, visit Ann Kordhal's panel on this topic. I'm hoping she and other participating on that panel will contribute next summer to this blog.

For now, thanks everyone for reading and supporting our voyage this summer. I hope to SAIL with you again next summer. And in the meantime, if you're part of the Global Read Aloud project and are reading THE BRIDGE HOME, or would just like to have more information on my work, please visit my author website: www.padmavenkatraman.com

God in a Carton of Eggs

 by ABBEY NASH

God in a Carton of Eggs

The Christianity I grew up with was a mixed bag of traditions, which invited curiosity and exploration.

While my father had been raised as a Southern Baptist preacher’s kid, the kind that didn’t believe in drinking, cursing, or dancing, and was himself an ordained Southern Baptist minister, my pre-adolescent years were spent on a non-denominational Christian commune in rural Georgia, where the dirt was almost as red as the strawberries we picked fresh from the communal fields.

This community, Koinonia, which means fellowship, is still active today, though the day-to-day experience of living there may be somewhat different than what I remember. When I wasn’t in school, I spent my days with my friends, visiting the farm animals, and on rare occasion, taking guided night walks through the woods in search of the mysterious luminescent mushrooms that grew there.

Church at Koinonia was community ministers, torn songbooks, and barefoot toddlers playing in the grass. It was Sunday potlucks and sunrise service on Easter and square-dancing afterwards on the lawn. 

My experience at Koinonia formed my foundational view of Christianity—that “church,” in the metaphorical sense of the word, means community between people and God.

When we left Koinonia, I found that “church” was housed in buildings and that there were rules about what you wore and how you behaved and what you believed. We lived in Mississippi then, and as a high school student, I found these rules to be similar to the unspoken rules that drew lines between my peers. Some kids were “in” and others were “out.” At the same time, religion seemed a synonym for hypocrisy. In the evangelical town in which we lived, the same teenagers who walked, tear-stricken, to the altar on Sunday morning to receive “Christ into their hearts” were planning the neighborhood keggers the following Saturday night. Religion seemed more about appearances and less about a way of life.

As an adult, I have a found a Christian religion which values charity and action rather than faith alone and believes in universal salvation. These are tenets which resonate deeply with my core belief system. This is the religion my husband was raised in, the one I’m choosing to raise my children in. However, even this religion has rules with which I can’t abide—rules made not by God but by man, rules that are about fear and exclusion. 

I often hear people say that they are “spiritual” but not “religious.” There is cultural and religious pushback on this spreading sentiment, as though these “spiritual” people are somehow lazy or undisciplined because they are not aligning themselves with a specific religion.

On the contrary, I feel that religion is a manmade construct, as fallible as the stone and brick churches that house its weekly meetings. When people say that they are spiritual but not religious, they are resisting aligning themselves with some aspect of Christianity where man has gotten in the way and made rules that restrict their ability to be in community with God and with the people around them. Our egos tell us to exclude, so that we can protect our fragile belief systems. Love tells us there’s always room for one more.

Over the last few years, I’ve faced several personal challenges. These challenges, which have included my younger brother’s addiction and my epilepsy, have required me to draw on a deep well of faith that I didn’t know I had—one that is supported not by the rulesof my religion, but by its existence, as well as by the support communities in my life, and most importantly, by my personal relationship with God. 

Sometimes church is the small congregation I join with each Sunday to enjoy incredible music and learn about the ways I can apply the tenets of my religion to my everyday life. 

Sometimes church is Ala-Non, where I can speak freely about loving someone with addiction and learn tools that help me to accept what isso that I can let go of the chaos of trying to change my brother and my epilepsy diagnosis, choosing instead to focus on the love available in the present moment.

Sometimes church is my support group at the Eastern PA Epilepsy foundation, where my experiences are fully seen by people who are living them, too—where I am not someone with a disability, but someone living a full life of which epilepsy is only a small part. 

Often church is writing—usually in my journal, a habit I started in second grade, when my grandmother put my very first journal in my hand, destining me on this path. Writing is truly my “lifeline.” With a pen in my hand, I can most clearly hear the “the still small voice of God,” lovingly guiding me through my greatest fears and my most difficult challenges. 

These things—Ala-Non, my epilepsy support group, my writing—they are not separate from God, but of God. They allow me to be in communion with God and with the people that I believe God puts in my path to help me further grow into spiritual maturity. 

Recently, I was having a particularly challenging day. I couldn’t shake the “why me” narrative that we all struggle with from time to time. I was emotional—angry and resentful. My husband and I went for a walk, and over the course of the walk, I began to take in the beauty of my surroundings. The warmth of the sun, even in the winter, the blue sky. On the way home, we stopped by my brother-in-law’s house for a quick visit with my nieces. Their chubby pink cheeks and sweet giggles always put me in a good mood. By the time we got home, my anger had melted into gratitude for the preciousness of my life, despite its challenges, and I found myself in tears. I decided to make brunch, and when I opened the carton of eggs, I was surprised to read a quote printed on the inside of the carton: “This is the day the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.”

True Christianity doesn’t have to be perfect or look a certain way. In fact, it probably looks pretty lived in. It’s the ability to see God in the faces of the people around us, to be willing to be in communion with them, despite (or perhaps even because of) their differences, to be humble enough to serve those in need, and to be open-minded enough to learn and grow from these experiences as we have them. 

Born to parents with a serious case of “wanderlust,” Abbey Lee Nash has lived in some pretty interesting places, including on a Christian farming commune in rural Georgia, above a third-world craft store in Kentucky, and on a Salvation Army retreat center in the Pennsylvania mountains. She currently lives outside of Philadelphia with her husband, two daughters, and one very rambunctious Australian Shepherd. She received her MA in English from Arcadia University in 2011, and currently works at Bryn Athyn College where she teaches writing and literature. She is also an active member of the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators. Lifeline is her first novel. 

Learn more about Abbey at https://www.abbeynash.com/ and connect with her on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/abbeynashbooks/ and Twitter: @nash_abbey.

What Are You?

by Veera Hiranandani

What Are You?

This is a question I’ve received many times in the context of my religious identity. I think many children of interfaith marriages get asked this question. I also don’t consider myself a religious person in the traditional sense and, at first, I wasn’t even sure what to write about for this post. For someone, however, who doesn’t label themselves as religious, I spend an awful lot of time writing about my character’s religious identities. In fact, I think about religious identity all the time. 

Organized religion has always been a confusing area of my life. I was raised in a mostly secular home with a Hindu father who immigrated to the United States from India and a Jewish mother born and raised in New York. My parents married in 1968 against their families wishes. When I was born, however, both sides of my family had worked through their issues enough for my sister and I to feel embraced by both sides of the family. 

I don’t think my parents found much comfort through religion. First, it threatened to separate them. There’s also a lot of pain and prosecution associated with religious identity in both of my backgrounds. My father’s family had to leave their home during the religious conflicts that created the Partition of India in 1947. My grandfather on my mother’s side immigrated to this country from Poland to escape the Holocaust. 

In my first book, The Whole Story of Half a Girl, I wrote about a character who, like me, has Hindu and Jewish parents and tries to figure out how she identifies. For my most recent book, The Night Diary, I wrote about a child living through the Partition of India who has a Hindu father and a Muslim mother and has to decide where she belongs as her country is being torn apart along religious lines. For my next book, I’m writing about a young Jewish girl growing up in Connecticut whose older sister elopes with an Indian Hindu college student in the 1960s. 

These stories are inspired by my own family history and all of the main characters question what religion means to them and how it compares to those around them. I’ve wondered many times if I feel “more” of one religion than the other. Growing up, my household practiced more Jewish traditions than Hindu ones, but my parents ultimately left these questions up to me. When I was young, I felt confused. I wanted a clear label for myself because it seemed like everyone around me had one. Later, I studied Hinduism in college to try and understand my background more, but after 47 years on the earth, I still don’t know the answer. The main difference now is that I’m stimulated by these questions and understand that religious identity can be murky for many. In some ways, it’s become my muse.  

At times I have wondered if it would be simpler to let the questioning go and reject my religious identities altogether. I’ve heard people say, including my own parents, that the world would have less conflict if we didn’t have religion. I disagree. Yes, we have seen organized religion tear people apart all over the world. Sometimes people claim their religion as the “right” one and feel prejudice towards others who don’t share their beliefs. But I have also seen religion bring great comfort in dark times and make happy milestones even more meaningful. I have seen it provide community and structure in people’s lives. I have seen members of temples, mosques, and churches come together and work hard to help those in need. 

In all religious groups, there are extremists who use religion to gain power through violence and domination. Many wars have started in the name of one religion or another. I see this as sadly part of the human condition, the underbelly of something meant to make people feel less alone in the universe. To me, that is the main purpose of a higher being—to provide a certain companionship to the human soul. I truly believe that if humans weren’t fighting about religion or using religion in their wars, they would choose something else. And, as we know, religion is just one of the many identities we fight about.  

I think we created religious philosophies to provide structure and community, to answer the unknown, and to have something to believe in that feels bigger than ourselves. There are many ways besides organized religion to satisfy those needs and I find that a buffet works for me. I take a little of this and that and cobble together my own form of spirituality. If you asked me if I believed in god, I would say no, but if you asked me if I believe in something bigger than myself, I would say yes. I feel connected to both my Jewish and Hindu identities and still practice certain traditions in my home. They provide comfort, ritual, and connect me to my ancestors. So, what am I? I plan to spend the rest of my life enjoying the pursuit of that question. 

Veera Hiranandani is the award-winning author of The Night Diary (Kokila), which received the 2019 Newbery Honor Award, the 2019 Walter Dean Myers Honor Award and the 2018 Malka Penn Award for Human Rights in Children's Literature. The Night Diary has been featured on NPR's Weekend Edition, is a New York Times Editor's Choice Pick, and was chosen as a 2018 Best Children's Book of the Year by The New York Times, The Washington Post, NPR, Amazon, School Library Journal, and Kirkus Reviews, among others. She is also the author of The Whole Story of Half a Girl (Yearling), which was named a Sydney Taylor Notable Book and a South Asian Book Award Finalist, and the chapter book series, Phoebe G. Green (Grosset & Dunlap). She earned her MFA in fiction writing at Sarah Lawrence College. A former book editor at Simon & Schuster, she now teaches creative writing at Sarah Lawrence College's Writing Institute and is working on her next novel. 

Find out more about Veera at: https://www.veerahiranandani.com

The Unconscious Power of Faith

by Leah Henderson

The Unconscious Power of Faith

Faith and spirituality have always been an important part of my upbringing. Church every Sunday and Wednesday night, Sunday School, Bible study (with a graphic novel Bible), choir, prayers over meals, church picnics, mom singing gospel while she worked, and listening to it over the radio during car rides was just how it was growing up. I never really took note of how faith, spirituality, and belief influenced how I went about my daily life—it just did. Prayers for strength and guidance, aren’t new to me either, and I often look up to the sky asking how come a hurdle or road block is put on my path or simply just to ask why. That connection to my faith is strong. So, when I finished my first novel I shouldn’t have been surprised to realize just how much faith and spirituality informed my character’s journey as well.

When I started writing One Shadow on the Wall, which takes place in Senegal, West Africa, I didn’t intend for religion, superstition, and spirituality to make their way into the storyline, but just like in my life, they appeared in big and small ways. My main character’s source of belief, will, and protection came from his parent’s strong connection to their Muslim faith, as well as from a deep cultural belief system many Senegalese adhere to, which is often intertwined with superstition. My character wore gris-gris, small leather pouches filled with Koranic scriptures around his upper arm and waist to ward off evil and he prayed each morning just as his father taught him. Over and over I found him or others asking Allah to bless their journeys and hopes. 

Without realizing it, certain markers of faith were being woven into my character’s world. Yet it wasn’t until I began to take a closer look at how superstition and faith linked that I truly took note of the fascinating spiritual culture being highlighted in my book. Senegal, the “land of teranga,” a place of community, connection, and hospitality is known for its understanding, respect, and tolerance of different religions. And I was seeing that unfold during a number of scenes, especially the most pivotal ones.

At first, I shied away from exploring what role superstition played within the culture, because what did I know? Nothing. But even though I do not have the same belief system as my characters, I understand what faith looks like and how it can work within daily life. I was apprehensive but as I kept reading, asking questions, and learning, I came to see that just like within my life, my character’s beliefs couldn’t be separated from him or the characters around him. I soon realized that if I wanted to create an accurate and authentic story, I needed to have faith in faith’s role in my work. 

So, I wonder, in what ways are religion, faith, and spirituality linked in your life and your stories in both conscious and unconscious ways?

Leah Henderson is the author of the middle grade novel One Shadow on the Wall, a Children’s Africana Book Award notable, and a Bank Street Best Book. Her forthcoming picture books include Together We March, Day For Rememberin’, and Mamie on the Mound. She also has a new middle grade novel  The Magic in Changing Your Stars on the horizon.

Find out more about Leah Henderson at: http://www.leahhendersonbooks.com