Juniper's Playground

Beloved Blockheads

There is a children’s playground at LakeLight Sanctuary. It’s by the woodlands towards the back, past the gift shop, pottery and tearooms. There is a long adventure section big and sturdy enough for older kids and teens, with ropes and treehouses and lots of climbing built in, wooden ladders and frames, against the backdrop of the trees behind.

There are several heights of slide, swings that cater to all ages, along with roundabouts, tyre swing ropes and all the things that you need to wear the little tykes out - I mean, to cater to all the youngsters’ every need and whim. Well, almost. And it has soft, well-tended grass and that spongy stuff that looks like rubbery tarmac (I have no idea what this is called) that makes sure all unexpected clashes with the forces of gravity remain safe.

And why not, since it is an imaginary playground at this stage, it may as well have everything we and our imaginary friends can think of. But there is one very special item. Juniper’s seesaw.

This seesaw only needs one child (or childlike adult) to work it, because on the other ends sits Brother Juniper. Here, he may only be animatronic, but he remains patiently present, always waiting for the fuss to die down and the onlookers to let him be.

Over the past few years, maybe a decade or so, I’ve slowly been becoming attuned to the Franciscans. I now think I probably am one. Everything I read or come across about Francis enthuses me, and there are no two Christian writers alive today whom I click with more (along with much nodding and underlining) than Richard Rohr and Ilia Delio, both Franciscans. I heartily recommend their work and wisdom.

St Clare is especially dear to me, on which more later. But there is also a special place in my affections reserved for another early member of the Franciscan order, Brother Juniper. I have even brought him into the modern day, reimagined as a clumsy friar on a mission to save a local park in Chicago, in my as yet unpublished middle grade novel (for 8-12s).

Juniper was humble, devoted, often infuriatingly unworldly. The concept of private property was particularly baffling to him. He consistently applied kingdom principles to earthly life, often with hilarious consequences. The chronicler of the Little Flowers of Saint Francis tells us that once, on a pilgrimage to Rome, his reputation for holiness preceeding him, many came out to see him, wanting to accompany this great man of God into the holy city.

Juniper, hating pride more than anything, decided to halt this nonsense by playing on a seesaw for many hours. The people got fed up of waiting, and pronounced him ‘a blockhead.’ I expect he had endeared himself to a great many children, however! Once those who would do him honour had given up and gone home, he got up and entered the city.

Image by Manfred Antranias Zimmer from Pixabay

I think perhaps we need Juniper’s humility more than ever, in our polarised, individualised world. As I ponder this, I remember that I sometimes feel foolish that I am writing books (mostly for children) in a world that has lost its way of valuing innocence, story, and wisdom. There seems especially little room for Christian literature. I hope I will be proved wrong on that.

There must surely still be a place for story, laughter, terrible puns, for characters who try their best to combat villains, and worlds where good eventually wins out. Because this is the heroic path we aare all walking. As Christians we try to walk it humbly, with our God.

Every day is a battle, every moment and lifetime holds its own story. I shall keep listening for the ones that fall into my already overstuffed head, and like dear Juniper, keep to my small space, going up and down, putting words on pages, returning constantly to the ground, and not letting crowds turn my head from the little ones and the joy of playing with words.

I may not be getting nearer the city, but I am doing what I was made to do. Perhaps we and our children might want to take a leaf out of Juniper’s own book, and remember to play in the park, never taking ourselves too seriously. Never afraid to look foolish, to wait, to spend time with God, even as he sits on the other side of the seesaw from us whilst the world pronounces us blockheads.