Loading...The last campers for Summer 2011 left All Saints Conference Center on Friday, July 15, concluding a successful summer program that was a lot about Harry Potter and friends.
All four camps were devoted to exploring Christian values and themes found in the pages of the J. K. Rowling’s Harry Potter saga. Using film clips to help with illustration, the camps for youngsters from second through sixth grades focused on the first book in the Harry Potter series and the other camps, for junior and senior high students, drew their discussion material from all of the books.
“The clergy did an amazing job in general and in making the theme age appropriate,” said camp director, Beth Bojarski, who is the diocese’s director of youth programs.
Potter, friends and faith
Harry Potter’s scar and what famiies look like were topics of discussion during the primary and New Horizons camps. “They talked about what it means to be marked for Christ and, therefore, empowered to make good decisions,” Bojarski said. For their crafts projects, they wrote down the names of the people and things that supported them in decision-making and then rolled up the paper to make wands.
During the senior high camp, she said, “we talked about choices quite a bit and the things that ground us.” The seniors explored the question “What does it mean to be called by God in an Episcopal community?” because, she said, “that can be different than what you hear in school, certainly in the Bible Belt. We are just as called by God as anyone else, so we shouldn’t be afraid of that language. We should embrace it and find out what our gifts and talents are and what God wants us to do with our lives.”
The seniors also talked about how life is ambiguous. “The beauty of Harry Potter is that he is a scrawny, average kid who has been given this gift,” Bojarski said. “That’s why Harry Potter is also popular… He didn’t know that he was special. He wasn’t like the Superman types, extroverted, popular, and strong…. We don’t connect with them like we do Harry Potter.”
“With junior high, the Christian ed focused on our spiritual gifts,” she said. “We identified our mentors who help us bring those out, what a Christian community is and how can we rely on it.” She also noted that the Rev. Amy Coultas, the camp chaplain, astutely observed that Ron, Hermione and Harry bring gifts that associate them with “the three-legged stool”: reason, tradition and scripture. Hermione’s gift is intelligence; Ron brings an unbelievable sense of loyalty and history, and Harry, whose gifts included abundant generosity, is the story, she said.
New at camp
The popular camp game this year, across the board, was the Hogwarts School’s famed Quidditch, made famous by Harry Potter. Bojarski likened their camp version to “La Crosse meets dodge ball meets hide-and-seek.” As last year, the camps featured an outdoor, environmental program. The focus last year was on trees; this year, critters got the spotlight.
A total of 153 campers attended, the number slightly down from last year because family camp was not offered again. About a third to half of the registrations were submitted online, the first time for this option. Bojarksi also noted the camps had good volunteer participation. In addition to the six chaplains, 12 people, including one priest, volunteered to assist with camp activities.
This year’s camp program also introduced a new “counselor-in-training program” for the older campers. The program, offered as a camp at the same time as the primary camp, was successful, she said. “It balanced their desire to be at camp with the younger kids, and my need for supervision since they are not 18,” said Bojarski. “We had very intentional trainings with them.” The CIT campers, for example, learned about “what it means to be a counselor,” “how you lead games,” and “what a seven year old needs from us.” She expects the program to grow next year, she said.
Camp counselors' go to reading camp
Also noteworthy, the camp staff, as in prior years, took a mission trip during the week break between camps. They traveled to Paducah, where they volunteered, on a rotating basis, at the local AIDS/HIV clinic and food ministries program but spent the bulk of their time assisting with the annual reading camp at Grace Church. The reading camp is inspired by one run by the Diocese of Lexington, and Bojarski is hopeful that our diocese will host a residential reading camp program at All Saints in the near future. Indeed, she said she would love to hear from anyone interested in assisting with the planning.
Camp program in retrospect
Reflecting on the success of this year’s camp program, Bojarski said, “All Saints is about having fun, making friends, and retaining children’s faith. That really is ultimately what we are all about. We’re teaching them things as well, but shat what we’re really about is fun, friendship and faith. That is what I think we do really well.”
