At the �Congo Church,� as some of my younger friends called the Congregational Church in Wilton, Connecticut, where I was hired as an associate pastor in 1968, it was made clear to me from the very beginning that the older youth had no interest in any kind organized church activity.  Soon, however, the visions and dreams of these older kids and I synchronized.  It began with a filmstrip on �Modern Art and the Gospel� that I was planning to use in our religious education program..  Bradley Barnes, then maybe 18, suggested that, after playing the recorded sound track, we run the filmstrip through silently and substitute tunes of our own against the very effective filmstrip visuals.  That�s how I remember it, anyway.  In any case, this method of juxtaposing diverse media components became a winning formula, and more and more socially conscious, artistic members of the younger generation within and beyond the congregation hooked up with our efforts.  It was Bradley, I�m sure, who was largely responsible for the festivities of our group on a particular night that revolved around feet. His friend, Dusty Matthews, was there to inaugurate his very accomplished rock band, �simple truth,� and after they performed, he read my piece on feet from �Wheels in the Air.�  Simultaneously, members of our group were offering to wash and powder the feet of anyone who so desired.  Others explored the tactile magic of liquefying cornstarch and food coloring. �Bill Joyner

Be not conformed to this world, but be ye transformed by the renewal of your mind. � St. Paul in Romans

We would rather be ruined than changed,

We would rather die in our dread

Than climb the cross of the moment

And let our illusions die.  � W.H. Auden in THE AGE OF ANXIETY

Together, religion and education often teach blind adherence to tradition, conformity to social mores, and unquestioning obedience, all of which open the door to violence. Ultimately, the goal of all education and religion should be to inspire and equip people to fight for life, for themselves and for all people. � Israel Charney

When you watch television, you never see people watching television. We love television because it brings us a world in which television does not exist. � Barbara Ehrenrh

When things come to us, we must understand them from the ground up. � THE SECRET OF THE GOLDEN FLOWER

The biggest enemy to learning is the talking teacher.  � John Holt

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How do any of us ever fundamentally change, inasmuch as we generally learn only what we want to learn and believe only what we want to believe? Is it not primarily through our relationships with people we admire that we come to understand life differently?  And through artistic works of great imaginative power that somehow subvert our normal defenses against what�s different and unknown.  How do we change?  By falling in love.  � BJ

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