WHEN I WAS 7 or 8, I drew a picture of God in Sunday school. I may have been given a coloring sheet, but I knew I needed a blank sheet of paper that morning. Thankfully, I was in a church that trusted and listened to children and provided me access to crayons and paper. They didn’t stifle my creative impulse. I started with a big circle and confidently mapped out a visage that was male and female, happy and sad, and reflecting all of creation. I shared it with my class and my teacher asked me to share my picture during worship, a gathering of about 40 people on folding chairs. Even as a young child, I felt like a valued member of New Community Church, one of a handful of small churches affiliated with the Church of the Saviour in Washington, D.C. It did not feel strange when my pastor encouraged me to talk about my picture in church or when the adults listened. Later, a church member and poet, Cheryl K. Hellner, interviewed me for Potter’s House Press, a small “journal of faith and the arts.” This is how I described my drawing:
I was going to draw another part right there / to make it sometimes happy and sometimes frowning / It’s divided up into four halves / On this whole half is the woman’s part / and this half — it’s the man’s / And this eye is the world, and this eye is space / This eye is really the planets / And then the nose is space / And this part is nature / And this part is people / And all of it is God.
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