SING TO THE POWER
A Tapestry of Faith Program for Children
SESSION 10: THE POWER OF PASSION
BY REV. LYNN UNGAR
© Copyright 2012 Unitarian Universalist Association.
Published to the Web on 11/8/2014 2:46:40 PM PST.
This program and additional resources are available on the UUA.org web site at
www.uua.org/religiouseducation/curricula/tapestryfaith.
SESSION OVERVIEW
INTRODUCTION
Every great dream begins with a dreamer. Always remember, you have within you the strength, the patience, and the passion to reach for the stars to change the world. — Harriet Tubman
The power of fire is the power of passion, of allowing the heart to lead us to good actions. When we follow our passion for a more just world, we see amazing results. The children learn how Hannah Salwen inspired her family's decision to sell their mansion and give half the proceeds to a charity which they chose. Participants practice advocating a cause they care deeply about. Then the group will choose a cause, and prepare to engage the congregation to support it with half of a Sunday offering.
GOALS
This session will:
LEARNING OBJECTIVES
Participants will:
SESSION-AT-A-GLANCE
Activity | Minutes |
Opening | 5 |
Activity 1: Story — The Power of Half | 10 |
Activity 2: Advocating for Favorite Causes | 20 |
Activity 3: Preparing to Make a Case for Congregation to Participate in Power of Half | 20 |
Faith in Action: Planning Our Power of Fire | 30 |
Closing | 5 |
Alternate Activity 1: Sharing Joys and Sorrows | 10 |
Alternate Activity 2: Song — "From You I Receive" | 10 |
Alternate Activity 3: Alternative Dreidel Game | 15 |
SPIRITUAL PREPARATION
Find a place where you can be quiet with your thoughts. Close your eyes and breathe deeply for several minutes, perhaps repeating a word or phrase to separate yourself from the activities of the day. When you feel settled and relaxed, consider:
SESSION PLAN
OPENING (5 MINUTES)
Materials for Activity
Preparation for Activity
Description of Activity
The opening ritual for this program invites children to practice leadership and experience the power of a group coming together in sacred space.
Gather the children in a circle around the chalice. Invite them to take a deep breath, release it, and create a deep silence for a moment.
Invite the day's opening worship leader to select a reading from the Opening Words Basket and read it aloud (or, to read aloud the reading they prepared after the previous session).
Place the fire symbol on the cloth—or invite the volunteer opening worship leader to place a symbol they have brought. Say, "I bring this symbol of fire, of strength and daring, light and warmth."
As needed, assist the worship leader to light the chalice.
Sing "Sing to the Power." Include the zipper words from previous sessions and add today's zipper words, "passion to help."
Invite participants to hold hands in a circle. Explain, in these words or your own:
Each time the group meets, we focus on ways we find and express our power. As part of each opening circle, we send a pulse of energy, or power, around the circle.
Begin the power pulse by squeezing the hand of the person to your left, who will then squeeze the hand of the person to their left, followed by each person in rapid succession. Send the power pulse around the circle several times.
Conclude the power pulse. While still holding hands, ask the group to take a deep breath together, bringing their hands up as they breathe in, and bringing their hands down as they breathe out.
Return the reading to the Opening Words Basket and extinguish the chalice.
Including All Participants
Some participants may be uncomfortable being touched. Offer the opportunity to opt out of the circle during the time when participants are holding hands for the power pulse.
ACTIVITY 1: STORY — THE POWER OF HALF (10 MINUTES)
Materials for Activity
Preparation for Activity
Description of Activity
Read or tell the story to the group.
After the story, invite the group to be silent for a moment to think about the story.
Then, ask participants to recap the story in their own words. What they recall indicates what they found most meaningful or memorable.
Say something like:
Helping others can feel like a burden. I'm sure we've all had the experience of being asked to do a household chore and just feeling grumpy at being pulled away from doing something more fun. But the Salwen family was led by Hannah into giving a tremendous amount in a way that made them feel like their life was more joyful, and even more rich, than if they had kept their big house or their money.
Lead a discussion using these questions:
ACTIVITY 2: ADVOCATING FOR FAVORITE CAUSES (20 MINUTES)
Materials for Activity
Preparation for Activity
Description of Activity
Participants explore where they might find their own passion for making change in the world.
Take the first 10 minutes to lead brainstorming on how participants might want to make a difference. Ask: "What lights a fire inside you?" You might suggest sports, animals, camping, fashion, or music. How could they help others access the things that they love? How could they use their passions for these interests to make the world a better place?
Include online research in the brainstorming. Help participants investigate online to find helping organizations and projects that connect with their passions. Help them think of search terms that might turn up relevant organizations, nationally or in your area. Encourage them to choose an organization or project they are passionate about and get ready to share their passion for the cause with the group.
With ten minutes left, re-gather the group. Invite participants, one at a time, to briefly tell the group about their cause and why they think everyone should support it. Write the central ideas from each presentation on newsprint.
When everyone has had the chance to advocate, introduce the idea of asking the congregation to support a cause by donating half of a Sunday offering. Explain that as a group, you will choose a cause, and then share their passion for it with your congregation's leaders, as they have just practiced doing in the group.
Lead the group to discuss and choose one cause and organization to support. Where can you make a difference? What is most in line with Unitarian Universalist values and Principles? Which do group members feel most passionate about? Which one will get other people excited, too?
If at all possible, bring the group to consensus on a cause and organization. If consensus seems impossible in the time you have available, you may need to conclude this activity with a vote.
Including All Participants
Make sure quieter members of the group have the opportunity to have their voices heard. You might use a "talking stick" or another object for each speaker to hold. If any participants may be unwilling to speak to the whole group, you could pair participants for research and discussion, then have the less shy partner "advocate" for the cause they choose.
ACTIVITY 3: PREPARING TO MAKE A CASE FOR CONGREGATION TO PARTICIPATE IN POWER OF HALF (20 MINUTES)
Materials for Activity
Preparation for Activity
Description of Activity
Now that the group has chosen an organization or cause they want the congregation to support, participants prepare to ask for the congregation's involvement. Explain who you will be approaching with your request for support (e.g., the board of trustees, a minister, an administrator, an individual or committee who has decision-making power about finances). Have the group figure out how they might best make their case. Invite participants to take notes as you discuss these questions:
Have participants create a poster they can use as a visual aid in their presentation. Encourage them to draw pictures as well as writing some important, compelling points.
CLOSING (5 MINUTES)
Materials for Activity
Preparation for Activity
Description of Activity
Explain that the session is almost over and the group will now work together as a community to clean the meeting space. Ask everyone to clean their own area and put away the materials they were using, then clean another area or help someone else. No one should sit in the circle until the meeting space is clean.
Gather the group in a circle. Tape the "Passion" circle (Leader Resource 1) outside the "Fire" quadrant of the Circle of Elements mural, in the position shown on Session1, Leader Resource 3. Say:
The power of fire comes from the passion inside us, the joy that comes from being able to create positive change in the world.
Invite each participant to take a bead and string it on the elastic.
Use a match to light the taper candle. Invite each participant use the taper to light a tea light. Ask the day's closing worship leader to choose a reading from the Closing Words Basket and read it aloud (or, to read aloud the reading they prepared after the previous session).
Extinguish all flames.
Ask for (and record) volunteers to lead the opening and closing readings for the next session. Offer the volunteers a copy of Session 1, Leader Resource 1, Opening Words for Basket or Session 1, Leader Resource 5, Closing Words for Basket that they may take home to choose and practice their readings. Tell them they are also welcome to choose their reading from a basket when they come next time.
You may wish to invite the opening worship volunteer to bring a symbol of fire for the centering space as well.
Invite participants to put the bracelets in the Closing Words Basket. Distribute copies of the Taking It Home handout. Thank and dismiss participants.
FAITH IN ACTION: PLANNING OUR POWER OF FIRE (30 MINUTES)
Materials for Activity
Preparation for Activity
Description of Activity
This Faith in Action activity follows on the Exploring Ways to Exercise Fire Power activity in Session 5, as part of the four-session block which includes identifying a way to exercise air power, planning how to exercise air power, engaging in the activity and reflecting on the experience. After selecting an air power activity, the next step is to plan exactly how your project will take place. Who will take part — do you need to invite anyone not present to take part? What supplies will you need? How much time do you anticipate the project will take? When is the best time to undertake your project? Who needs to be contacted in order for your project to move forward? What resources do you have available to bring to bear on the project? What resources will you need to bring in? What are the steps in bringing your project to completion?
After the session, discuss the plan with the director of religious education and determine how to communicate the details to families.
Including All Participants
Make sure that your plan is as inclusive as possible of the differing needs and abilities of your group.
LEADER REFLECTION AND PLANNING
Reflect on and discuss with your co-leader(s):
Approach the director of religious education for guidance, as needed.
TAKING IT HOME
Every great dream begins with a dreamer. Always remember, you have within you the strength, the patience, and the passion to reach for the stars to change the world. — Harriet Tubman
IN TODAY'S SESSION... the children heard the true story of the Salwen family who, at the urging of their teenage daughter, sold their mansion, bought a smaller house with half the proceeds, and donated the other half to an organization the family chose together with great care and deliberation. The children focused on finding and choosing an organization that our group feels passionate about supporting, and preparing to ask our congregation to support that organization by donating half of a Sunday offering.
EXPLORE THE TOPIC TOGETHER. Are there causes your family is passionate about supporting? How involved are children in decisions about how your family contributes to charity? How involved are children in direct action in service to others? Is anyone in your family truly passionate about a cause to make the world a better place? How do they express their passion? How does the rest of your family support them?
FAMILY GAME. Perhaps your family has played the dreidel game as part of a Chanukah celebration. You can play an alternate version of this game as a way of exploring the "power of half." Follow the usual instructions for playing dreidel (at www.wikihow.com/Play-Dreidel), but when the letter hay comes up, rather than taking half of the tokens in the pot, the player contributes half of the tokens they have accumulated to another player of their choice. When the game is done, talk about how it felt to be giving items away, rather than taking them. How did the players choose the recipient who would get half their tokens?
FAMILY ADVENTURE. Choose something your family can contribute half of. It might be your time and effort for half a Saturday, half the non-perishable items in your pantry, half of a weekly allowance, or half the amount you would spend on a family outing or movie. Decide together how and where to donate your "half." Afterward, talk together about what the experience was like for each member of your family.
ALTERNATE ACTIVITY 1: SHARING JOYS AND SORROWS (10 MINUTES)
Materials for Activity
Preparation for Activity
Description of Activity
Say:
Our community is like a bowl that holds all of our lives. The joys and sorrows which affect each person's life send ripples through all of our lives.
Invite participants, as they are moved, to pick up a stone, drop it gently (!) in the bowl of water, and share aloud a joy or a sorrow which has affected their life in recent days. Say they may drop their stone in silence, instead; tell them it is okay to keep their joys or sorrows private. You might go first, to model.
Once all who wish to have shared, affirm all the words people have spoken and the thoughts and feelings that remain inside each person's head and heart.
ALTERNATE ACTIVITY 2: SONG — "FROM YOU I RECEIVE" (10 MINUTES)
Materials for Activity
Preparation for Activity
Description of Activity
The song "From You I Receive," by Joseph and Nathan Segal, is a perfect expression of the experience of giving. If your group will be involved in asking the congregation to contribute to a Sunday morning offering, half of which will go to an organization of your group's choosing, this activity prepares the group to lead the congregation in singing, as part of that worship service.
Teach the song by singing the first line and having the group sing it back to you, then doing the same with the second line. Sing the song several times through, until the group is completely secure with it. Then you might wish to try singing it as a round, with the second group starting when the first group has reached the end of the first line.
ALTERNATE ACTIVITY 3: ALTERNATIVE DREIDEL GAME (15 MINUTES)
Materials for Activity
Preparation for Activity
Description of Activity
The dreidel game is a popular Hanukkah activity, but an altered version can also be a fun way to explore the power of giving half. Follow the usual instructions, but when the letter hay comes up, rather than taking half of the tokens in the pot, the player contributes half of the tokens they have accumulated to another player of their choice. When the game is done, talk about how it felt to be giving items away, rather than taking them. How did the players choose the recipient who would get half their tokens? Do they think the game would work better in the traditional way, in which players take half of the pot when the hay comes up, or is it better this way? You may wish to give participants the option to try both versions.
Including All Participants
Be ready to help children spin the dreidel.
SING TO THE POWER: SESSION 10:
STORY: THE POWER OF HALF
Sometimes a big idea starts with noticing small things. One day 14-year-old Hannah Salwen was in the car with her father, stopped at a stoplight under a bridge. Hannah noticed that just off the road on her right was a homeless person carrying a cardboard sign asking for help, and to the left of their car was a very expensive Mercedes. Why, she wondered aloud to her father, couldn't the person to the left of them have a cheaper car so the person to the right of them could have enough to eat? Kevin, Hannah's father, agreed that she had a good point, but, he said, even the car they were driving in was certainly beyond what many people could afford.
For many people, the conversation would have ended there, but Hannah has a fire inside, a passion for justice that doesn't quit. And so she brought the question to her family. Why did they have so much when others had so little? Her parents responded by mentioning some things the family had done. They had volunteered for Habitat for Humanity, and Hannah's mom had left a very highly paid business job to become a teacher. Together the family delivered food through Meals on Wheels. The kids were required to set aside a third of their allowance to buy groceries for the homeless. Weren't they doing enough? And then Joan, Hannah's mom, threw out an idea that was only half-way a joke: Should they sell the beautiful historic mansion they lived in, get a smaller, cheaper house, and give away the money from the sale?
Hannah fell in love with idea immediately. Yes! That's exactly what they should do. Sell the house, use half the money to get another home half the size, and give away the other half of the money. At first Hannah's brother Joe thought she was nuts. Why would they want to move out of a house that was the envy of all their friends? And Kevin and Joan had to think long and hard about a decision that would have such a big effect on their family's finances.
But Hannah kept pushing. It was something they could do, and something they should do.
Through a whole series of family meetings, in which each person had an equal vote, the Salwens not only decided to sell their lovely home, they also figured out what to do with the money. They researched the kinds of needs that existed in the world and decided together that their money could make the biggest difference in Africa. Then they researched organizations working to make life better for people in different parts of Africa. The Salwens wanted to work with an organization that supported people in making their own lives better, not one that just went in and helped poor people without ideas and effort from the folks they were helping. The family traveled to meet with officials from four different organizations, and ended up choosing The Hunger Project, which helped villagers in Ghana to build community service centers.
In the meantime, the project got harder than anyone had expected. The housing market took a sudden drop, the economy tanked, and no one wanted to buy the Salwens' house for anything close to the 1.6 million dollars they had been expecting to get for it. But they had already committed $800,000 to the Hunger Project, and they didn't want to go back on their word. When their house eventually sold, there was a gap of $300,000 between what they had promised and the money they had available. The day was saved when a publisher agreed to pay $380,000 for the rights to a book that Joe and Hannah would write about their experiences. That book, The Power of Half, talks about the journey the family went through as they figured out their life-changing gift. It talks about the literal journey to Ghana they took, to see their project once it was underway. But more than, that it talks about how their family changed for the better when they all caught Hannah's fire to make a difference.
SING TO THE POWER: SESSION 10:
LEADER RESOURCE 1: "PASSION" CIRCLE
FIND OUT MORE
The Power of Half, by Kevin and Hannah Salwen, has ideas for how anyone can commit to the power of half and use the fire inside themselves to change the world. Three percent of your book purchase will go to The Hunger Project when you order from Barnes & Noble using this link (at www.goodsearch.com/barnes-noble/coupons).
Learn more about The Hunger Project (at www.thp.org/learn_more/news/latest_news/power_of_half_new_book_from_thp_investors_kevin_and_hannah_salwen).
A British Telegraph article about the Salwens (at www.telegraph.co.uk/family/7527861/The-Power-of-Half-how-Hannah-Salwen-and-her-family-gave-half-their-home-away.html) and their adventure in giving includes a picture of the family. A 2010 New York Times Op-Ed piece (at www.nytimes.com/2010/01/24/opinion/24kristof.html) by Nicholas Kristof offers further reflection. The Natural Home and Garden website posts an interview with Hannah Salwen (at www.naturalhomeandgarden.com/green-professionals/the-power-of-half-natural-home-interviews-hannah-salwen.aspx). You can even follow Kevin Salwen (at twitter.com/#!/kevinsalwen) on Twitter!