Can you imagine forgiving someone who struck you over the head with a baseball bat, nearly gouging out your eye?
Can you imagine recommending the person who injured you for the highest honor in his field?
Can you imagine offering a eulogy at the funeral of the man you struck with the bat?
This story really played out on the baseball field in 1965 when Juan Marichal of the San Francisco Giants attacked John Roseboro of the Los Angeles Dodgers in the middle of a game. You can read about the incident here.
Ask your students the questions posed above and briefly introduce the incident. Then play a twenty-two minute video documentary that explains what happened to Juan Marichal and John Roseboro in the years that followed.
After the video, write the following questions on the board for discussion or journal writing:
What is your reaction to the video?
How do you feel about John Roseboro?
How would you feel about Juan Marichal?
What did you learn about forgiveness and reconciliation from this story?
Create a worsheet from the material below. Use it as a short activity to begin or end a class period.
Read these Gospel passages to find out more about Jesus. Write an explanation to each yes or no answer for the following questions:
· Did Jesus have a best friend? (see Matthew 17:1–2)
· Did Jesus have women friends? (see Luke 8:1–3)
· Did Jesus ever get in trouble? (see John 2:13–17)
· Did Jesus have any fun? (see John 2:1–2)
· Was Jesus ever confused or depressed? (see Mark 14:32–35)
· Did Jesus ever get bothered by his friends? (see Mark 10:13–14)
· Did Jesus ever have disagreements with his parents? (see John 2:15)
· Did Jesus hang out with the “in” crowd? (see Matthew 9:9–13)
· Did Jesus get along with everybody? (see Matthew 22:15–22)
· Did Jesus ever get stressed out? (see Mark 3:7–12)
What did you find most surprising about Jesus from this exercise?
This famous short story written by William Sydney Porter under the penname “O. Henry” was first published in one of the New York City newspapers at the beginning of the twentieth century. It is a remarkable story of unfailing love between a husband and wife, and of self-gifts, both appropriate topics for Advent and Christmas. Share this story with your students. Ask them to complete both the Comprehension and Reflection questions.
One dollar and eighty-seven cents. That was all. And sixty cents of it was in pennies. Pennies saved one and two at a time by bulldozing the grocer and the vegetable man and the butcher until one’s cheeks burned with the silent imputation of parsimony that such close dealing implied. Three times Delia counted it. One dollar and eighty-seven cents. And the next day would be Christmas.
There was clearly nothing to do but flop down on the shabby little couch and howl. So Delia did it. Which instigates the moral reflection that life is made up of sobs, sniffles, and smiles, with sniffles predominating.
While the mistress of the home is gradually subsiding from the first stage to the second, take a look at the home. A furnished flat at $8 per week. It did not exactly beggar description, but it certainly had that word on the lookout for the mendicancy squad.
In the vestibule below was a letter-box into which no letter would go, and an electric button from which no mortal finger could coax a ring. Also appertaining thereunto was a card bearing the name “Mr. James Dillingham Young.”
The “Dillingham” had been flung to the breeze during a former period of prosperity when its possessor was being paid $30 per week. Now, when the income was shrunk to $20, though, they were thinking seriously of contracting to a modest and unassuming D. But whenever Mr. James Dillingham Young came home and reached his flat above he was called “Jim” and greatly hugged by Mrs. James Dillingham Young, already introduced to you as Delia. Which is all very good.
Delia finished her cry and attended to her cheeks with the powder rag. She stood by the window and looked out dully at a gray cat walking a gray fence in a gray backyard. Tomorrow would be Christmas Day, and she had only $1.87 with which to buy Jim a present. She had been saving every penny she could for months, with this result. Twenty dollars a week doesn’t go far. Expenses had been greater than she had calculated. They always are. Only $1.87 to buy a present for Jim. Her Jim. Many a happy hour she had spent planning for something nice for him. Something fine and rare and sterling—something just a little bit near to being worthy of the honor of being owned by Jim.
There was a pier-glass between the windows of the room. Perhaps you have seen a pier-glass in an eight dollar flat. A very thin and very agile person may, by observing his reflection in a rapid sequence of longitudinal strips, obtain a fairly accurate conception of his looks. Delia, being slender, had mastered the art.
Suddenly she whirled from the window and stood before the glass, her eyes were shining brilliantly, but her face had lost its color within twenty seconds. Rapidly she pulled down her hair and let it fall to its full length.
Now, there were two possessions of the James Dillingham Youngs in which they both took a mighty pride. One was Jim’s gold watch that had been his father’s and his grandfather’s. The other was Delia’s hair. Had the queen of Sheba lived in the flat across the airshaft, Delia would have let her hair hang out the window some day to dry just to depreciate Her Majesty’s jewels and gifts. Had King Solomon been the janitor, with all his treasures piled up in the basement, Jim would have pulled out his watch every time he passed, just to see him pluck at his beard from envy.
So now Delia’s beautiful hair fell about her rippling and shining like a cascade of brown waters. It reached below her knee and made itself almost a garment for her. And then she did it up again nervously and quickly. Once she faltered for a minute and stood still while a tear or two splashed on the worn red carpet.
On went her old brown jacket; on went her old brown hat. With a whirl of skirts and with the brilliant sparkle still in her eyes, she fluttered out the door and down the stairs to the street.
Where she stopped the sign read: “Mne. Sofronie. Hair Goods of All Kinds.” One flight up Delia ran, and collected herself, panting. Madame, large, too white, chilly, hardly looked the “Sofronie.”
“Will you buy my hair?” asked Delia.
“I buy hair,” said Madame. “Take yer hat off and let’s have a sight at the looks of it.”
Down rippled the brown cascade.
“Twenty dollars,” said Madame, lifting the mass with a practised hand.
“Give it to me quick,” said Delia.
Oh, and the next two hours tripped by on rosy wings. Forget the hashed metaphor. She was ransacking the stores for Jim’s present.
She found it at last. It surely had been made for Jim and no one else. There was no other like it in any of the stores, and she had turned all of them inside out. It was a platinum fob chain simple and chaste in design, properly proclaiming its value by substance alone and not by meretricious ornamentation—as all good things should do. It was even worthy of The Watch. As soon as she saw it she knew that it must be Jim’s. It was like him. Quietness and value—the description applied to both. Twenty-one dollars they took from her for it, and she hurried home with the eighty-seven cents. With that chain on his watch Jim might be properly anxious about the time in any company. Grand as the watch was, he sometimes looked at it on the sly on account of the old leather strap that he used in place of a chain.
When Delia reached home her intoxication gave way a little to prudence and reason. She got out her curling irons and lighted the gas and went to work repairing the ravages made by generosity added to love. Which is always a tremendous task, dear friends—a mammoth task.
Within forty minutes her head was covered with tiny, close-lying curls that made her look wonderfully like a truant schoolboy. She looked at her reflection in the mirror long, carefully, and critically.
“If Jim doesn’t kill me,” she said to herself, “before he takes a second look at me, he’ll say I look like a Coney Island chorus girl. But what could I do—oh! what could I do with a dollar and eighty-seven cents?”
At seven o’clock the coffee was made and the frying-pan was on the back of the stove hot and ready to cook the chops.
Jim was never late. Delia doubled the fob chain in her hand and sat on the comer of the table near the door that he always entered. Then she heard his step on the stair away down on the first flight, and she turned white for just a moment. She had a habit for saying little silent prayer about the simplest everyday things, and now she whispered: “Please God, make him think I am still pretty.”
The door opened and Jim stepped in and closed it. He looked thin and very serious. Poor fellow, he was only twenty-two—and to be burdened with a family! He needed a new overcoat and he was without gloves.
Jim stopped inside the door, as immovable as a setter at the scent of quail. His eyes were fixed upon Delia, and there was an expression in them that she could not read, and it terrified her. It was not anger, nor surprise, nor disapproval, nor horror, nor any of the sentiments that she had been prepared for. He simply stared at her fixedly with that peculiar expression on his face.
Delia wriggled off the table and went for him.
“Jim, darling,” she cried, “don’t look at me that way. I had my hair cut off and sold because I couldn’t have lived through Christmas without giving you a present. It’ll grow out again—you won’t mind, will you? I just had to do it. My hair grows awfully fast. Say ‘Merry Christmas!’ Jim, and let’s be happy. You don’t know what a nice—what a beautiful, nice gift I’ve got for you.”
“You’ve cut off your hair?” asked Jim, laboriously, as if he had not arrived at that patent fact yet even after the hardest mental labor.
“Cut it off and sold it,” said Delia. “Don’t you like me just as well, anyhow? I’m me without my hair, ain’t I?”
Jim looked about the room curiously.
“You say your hair is gone?” he said, with an air almost of idiocy.
“You needn’t look for it,” said Delia. “It’s sold, I tell you—sold and gone, too. It’s Christmas Eve, boy. Be good to me, for it went for you. Maybe the hairs of my head were numbered,” she went on with sudden serious sweetness, “but nobody could ever count my love for you. Shall I put the chops on, Jim?”
Out of his trance Jim seemed quickly to wake. He enfolded his Delia. For ten seconds let us regard with discreet scrutiny some inconsequential object in the other direction. Eight dollars a week or a million a year—what is the difference? A mathematician or a wit would give you the wrong answer. The magi brought valuable gifts, but that was not among them. This dark assertion will be illuminated later on.
Jim drew a package from his overcoat pocket and threw it upon the table.
“Don’t make any mistake, Dell,” he said, “about me. I don’t think there’s anything in the way of a haircut or a shave or a shampoo that could make me like my girl any less. But if you’ll unwrap that package you may see why you had me going a while at first.”
White fingers and nimble tore at the string and paper. And then an ecstatic scream of joy; and then, alas! a quick feminine change to hysterical tears and wails, necessitating the immediate employment of all the comforting powers of the lord of the flat.
For there lay The Combs—the set of combs, side and back, that Delia had worshipped long in a Broadway window. Beautiful combs, pure tortoise shell, with jewelled rims—just the shade to wear in the beautiful vanished hair. They were expensive combs, she knew, and her heart had simply craved and yearned over them without the least hope of possession. And now, they were hers, but the tresses that should have adorned the coveted adornments were gone.
But she hugged them to her bosom, and at length she was able to look up with dim eyes and a smile and say: “My hair grows so fast, Jim!”
And them Delia leaped up like a little singed cat and cried, “Oh, oh!”
Jim had not yet seen his beautiful present. She held it out to him eagerly upon her open palm. The dull precious metal seemed to flash with a reflection of her bright and ardent spirit.
“Isn’t it a dandy, Jim? I hunted all over town to find it. You’ll have to look at the time a hundred times a day now. Give me your watch. I want to see how it looks on it.”
Instead of obeying, Jim tumbled down on the couch and put his hands under the back of his head and smiled.
“Dell,” said he, “let’s put our Christmas presents away and keep ’em a while. They’re too nice to use just at present. I sold the watch to get the money to buy your combs. And now suppose you put the chops on.”
The magi, as you know, were wise men—wonderfully wise men—who brought gifts to the Babe in the manger. They invented the art of giving Christmas presents. Being wise, their gifts were no doubt wise ones, possibly bearing the privilege of exchange in case of duplication. And here I have lamely related to you the uneventful chronicle of two foolish children in a flat who most unwisely sacrificed for each other the greatest treasures of their house. But in a last word to the wise of these days let it be said that of all who give gifts these two were the wisest. Of all who give and receive gifts, such as they are wisest. Everywhere they are wisest. They are the magi.
Comprehension
How much had Jim’s salary been reduced?
What were the most precious possessions of the married couple?
How much was the wife paid for the sale of her hair?
What did the wife do with the money she received for her hair?
Why was the husband dumbfounded when he saw his Christmas gift—the platinum chain for his watch?
Reflection
What do the actions of the husband and wife tell us about real love?
Why does O. Henry compare this husband and wife to the magi of Scripture?
Trust is an important component of friendship, and closely related to faith. Trust is something people use to critique their personal relationships—both friendships and dating relationships. Create a worksheet with the following sentence starters. Each sentence should be finished with a first name. Accompany the activity with a discussion about trust and what the students learned from writing down these names.
Whom Do You Trust
Fill in the blanks of people you trust to
. . . keep a secret
__________________
. . . offer you sound advice
__________________
. . . always be there for you
__________________
. . . tell the truth no matter how bad—or how good—it is
__________________
. . . borrow your car
__________________
. . . stick up for you
__________________
. . . use your debit car
__________________
. . . look at your phone
__________________
. . . take care of you when you are sick
__________________
. . . take care of you if you were permanently disabled
__________________
This one-on-one discussion activity encourages students to meet and dialogue with a variety of people in class, including those they don’t know well or don’t know at all.
Make a worksheet with a large traditional clock with numbers on it. Print copies for every student. Tell them they will be finding people in class ask asking them to write their names on each hour of the clock. They can only use a person’s name one time. Read the items on the list one at a time, pausing between each item to allow the students to find a person and write in the other’s name.
Items
At twelve o’clock, exchange names with a person with different color hair than yours.
At one o’clock, exchange names with a person who lives more than five miles from where you live.
At two o’clock, exchange names with a boy if you are a girl, and a girl if you are a boy.
At three o’clock, exchange names with a person who is fan of a different sports team than you.
At four o’clock, exchange names with a person who has different musical tastes than you.
At five o’clock, exchange names with a person who has a different number of siblings than you.
At six o’clock, exchange names with a person who has different color eyes than yours.
At seven o’clock, exchange names with a person who is has a different political perspective than you.
At eight o’clock, exchange names with a person who hangs out with a different group of friends than you.
At nine o’clock, exchange names with a person who has a different hair length than you.
At ten o’clock, exchange names with a person with different color socks than yours.
At eleven o’clock, exchange names with a person who was born in a different month than you were.
When everyone has filled in a name at each time on the clock, tell them they are going to conduct short (one minute) interviews with the people they listed. Say: “Meet with your one o’clock appointment. Discuss this question: When was a time you got really angry and why?”
Allow one minute, call time and ask the participants to meet with their “two o’clock appointments.” Continue with the same process using the list of questions below.
Questions
When was the last time you got really angry? Why?
When was the last time you cried? Why?
On what basis do you choose your friends?
What advice would you give to a sixth grader?
Are you more of a leader or a follower? Explain.
How important to you is following the Ten Commandments?
How important to you is attending church on Sunday?
When do you pray? What does your prayer mean to you?
Who is a person who has influenced your life? How?
Who is an adult you find it easy to talk with? Why?
If you could go back in time, what period of history would you like to live in? Why?
Tell about a goal for your life.
You don’t see your students during summer vacation, but there are likely events for teens at local parishes that your students may benefit from. Just as important, you have students who would likely make excellent leaders of parish youth ministry programs.
Take some time to drop a note to local parish youth ministers and/or directors of religious education and do the following:
Inquire about summer events.
Ask how your former and future students might participate.
Provide the parish leaders with names and contact information of your students who may not be already enrolled in parish programming (if possible).
Share information about the course content your students covered this year with the parish leaders that they might enrich it in offerings over the summer.
Encourage parish leaders to send prospective students to visit your school. List yourself as a contact.
Recommend students who may be excellent members of a parish youth council or ministry team.
Here’s a short class opener that might be appropriate for the first day of a new semester.
Secure playing cards ace (one) through eight.
Print and number the following sentences on the board:
I want my friends to see me as a person who . . .
Academically, this semester I hope to . . .
This semester I hope to know God better by . . .
This semester I am looking forward to . . .
A person I would like to get to know better this semester is . . .
Athletically this semester I hope to . . .
Ten years from now I hope to . . .
After I die, I hope I will be remembered for . . .
Say:
Spend a few minutes deciding what you might say if you were called on to finish each of the sentences on the board. Think of endings that tell us something important about you and your values. You can work together with a partner to think up your answers.
When most are ready say:
I have in my hand playing cards valued from one (ace) to eight. When it is almost your turn, I will pull a number to tell you which sentence you are going to finish for us. You will be told your number one turn ahead so you have a minute to get your thoughts together.
Pick the numbers of the first two people. Call on a talkative person to give his or her first answer. After the person talks, allow the rest of the class to ask one or two follow up questions. Then pick a number for a third person as the second person answers his or her question.
Continue on for as long as you have time. When you play the game again, begin with students who didn’t get a chance to talk the first time.
Sr. Kieran Sawyer, S.S.N.D. shares information on how to promote meaningful dialogue in classroom discussions.
Dialogue in a religion classroom is an important element of an effective lesson. The interaction between students, whether on a one-to-one basis, in small groups, or in a large classroom discussion is an important part of forming faith. As teacher, you are both a facilitator of discussions and sometimes a participant as well.
Some dialogue is light and fun. When so, its purpose is to break down barriers and to build mutual understanding and enjoyment. It also carries over and makes serious dialogue possible. Serious dialogue, the heart of discussions in a religion course, helps students to share with one another topics revolving around their dreams and hopes, their questions and doubts, their values and goals, and their faith and prayer.
The dialogue process is based on several assumptions:
that faith is already present in each person, and that dialogue helps to surface, affirm, and strengthen that faith
that each person is a source of truth and wisdom, and that the truth of each individual is meant for and needed by the all the students in class
that all people, especially teenagers, want to open their hearts and share their deepest beliefs and doubts; all they need is listeners who care
that talking about the deepest values in a person’s life helps to clarify and strengthen them for the speaker; a person understands better what he or she has tried to articulate to another;
that the faith of the listener is also strengthened by the dialogue process; one of the most effective ways of alerting a person to the action of God in his or her own life is to hear about God’s action in the life of another
that dialogue creates common meanings and values that enable those who participate in it to become a community of faith.
Dialogue of the sort described here can only happen in an atmosphere of openness and trust. To establish such an atmosphere is to a large extent your responsibility as a teacher. But it is also true that dialogue itself can create such an atmosphere. Teenagers learn to share deeply with one another (and with adults) by dialoguing. Your role is to make it easy.
