Anti Bully Day AKA "Wear Pink Day"

This past Wednesday, our colleague led us in devotional/thought for the week related to "Anti-Bullying day". I never knew where this came from until he read us a brief story about the origin.

The pink movement was begun last fall by two Annapolis Valley students who rallied around a younger student after he was bullied for wearing a pink polo shirt on the first day of school.

David Shepherd and Travis Price, who were in Grade 12 at Central Kings Rural High School, asked all students at their school to wear pink T-shirts to combat bullying.

They bought 50 pink shirts from a discount store, then e-mailed classmates to get them on board. The next day, hundreds of students showed up wearing pink clothing. Before long, the movement had spread around the province and across the country.

I got a kick out of hearing where this originated as I went to university in the area and had to pass the school numerous times on my way around town.

Our colleague led us in a meditation about this....

May you trust God that you are exactly where you are meant to be.

Mat you not forget the infinite possibilities that are born of faith.

May you use those gifts that you have received and pass on the love that has been given to you.

May you be content kneeing you are a child of God.

Let this presence settle into your bones and allow your soul the freedom to sin, dance, praise and love.

Bullies’ words sing and slice through me.

Bullies’ words twist into shapes that beat me and leave me like a trampled leaf.

I run to hide but there is no safe corner.

I only need a small place to lick my wounds.

If God loves me enough to create me and to give me life, then I can love and respect myself no less. I no longer believe that I am undeserving of the good things in life made available for myself and everyone else in the world.

There are always times when we feel unlovely and unloved, bewildered, lost, unsure of who we are and of what is expected of us.

There always seem to be dark time of pain and confusion, of misunderstandings that become like tangled roots – twisted – without space to grow deeply.

I know that God is the one and only source of my being. Spirit Itself created me. Life Itself lives through me. Love Itself sustains me. I am an important and connected part of this spiritual universe.

Therefore: I ACCEPT my own beauty, and I see it reflected in the world around me.

I ACCEPT my own power, and I use it wisely.

I ACCEPT my own worth, and I live generously.

I ACCEPT my own love, and I share it freely.

I ACCEPT my own potential, and I live it fully.

There are always times when we feel trashed and rejected, sometimes by those close to us. And so we pack our pain away deep down, as deep as twisted roots, and tightly, very tightly, afraid it might be glimpsed, unpacked by cruel tongues.

My past, my false beliefs, and my feeling of unworthiness no longer define me. I accept full responsibility for my life, my thoughts, my feelings and my actions. I mat not always like what I do or how I feel, but I choose always to love myself in the meantime. Never again will I judge myself as undeserving of becoming the person I was meant to be.

Help us to disentangle the knots of confusion and misunderstanding,

To understand the hurts that other feel – that we have ignored.

To those who withhold refuge, I cradle you in safety at the core of my Being.

To those that cause a child to cry out, I grant you the freedom to express your own choked agony.

To those that inflict terror, I remind you that you shine with the purity of a thousand suns.

To those who would confine, suppress, or deny, I offer the limitless expanse of the sky.

To those who need to cut, or burn, I remind you of the invincibility of Spring.

To those who cling and grasp, I promise generosity without measure.

To those who vent their rage on small children, I return to you your deepest innocence.

To those who must frighten into submission, I hold you in the bosom of your original mother.

To those who cause agony to other, I give the gift of free flowing tears.

To those that deny another’s right to be, I remind you that the angels sang in celebration of you on the day of your birth.

To those who see only division and separateness, I remind you that a part is born only bisecting a whole.

For those who have forgotten the tender mercy of a mother’s embrace, I send a gentle breeze to caress your brow.

To those who still fee somehow incomplete, I offer the perfect sanctity of this moment.

Help us to speak of what we feel.

Help us to know when others need to speak so that then we can listen.

God the father and mother of us all, beyond our highest thoughts and deepest knowledge, who has given us the gift of language that we may communicate with one another and talk of every aspect of your created world, direct our mind and our lips that in all our dealings with others our word may be fair, so that we cause no hurt, and let our actions reflect the kindness of our words. Amen.

Help us to loosen the tight package of pain and move into new understandings.

Dear Lord, we know that you have given us the freedom to choose. We can choose whether to treat others with kindness and respect or to scorn, bully and abuse them. Help us to choose rightly.

Help us to recognize the divine image in each one of us, however different we may be as individuals.

Help us to resist the pressures of others who want us to join them in making someone a victim of their cruelty. Help us to know that in hurting others we are hurting our better selves and hurting you. Amen.

Let share, and search and listen; let us know ourselves more completely and feel an awakened sense of all that is good and true spilling over into riches of brightness and love.

May the God of light shine from us; the love of God flow through us; the power of God inspire us; and the presence of God make us bold in the ways of peace so that wherever we are, God is, and all may be well. Amen.