Spirituality at the School Gate
The Importance of Encounter
By Diane Jackson
(From the October - December 2020 issue of VOX)
On a dull, drizzly day in early April 2020, a UPS delivery man pulled up at our gate. So far so very normal during Covid-19 lockdown, as online shopping was the only way to buy any goods that weren’t groceries or medicine. Except it wasn’t another Amazon delivery of books or toilet brushes and exercise mats; it was 100 much anticipated, but unannounced and hot-off-the press copies of my very own book. During the academic year of 2018-19, I completed a Masters in Applied Spirituality from Waterford Institute of Technology, which is hosted and supported by the Spirituality Institute for Research and Education (SpIRE) in Dublin. My new book Spirituality at the School Gate: The Importance of Encounter is the result of my research dissertation.
Spirituality is one of those words people struggle to define, and in this instance, simply put, spirituality is the lived experience of Christian faith. In the context of my research, I described School Gate Spirituality as how mothers of Christian faith experience, express and practice their spirituality in the specific, everyday location of their children’s school gate.
In the foreword, Dr Gladys Ganiel from Queen’s University writes that the book, “…makes a compelling case that women’s experiences as they deposit and collect children at school gates can be sites for meaningful human (and divine) encounters.”
The school gate needs little introduction to most of us; we all have an experience of it. Whether it is your own memories of skipping out to meet your mum or dad full of news of that day’s highs and lows in the classroom; or you are now a parent, or grandparent who, (prior to the current global pandemic which necessitated schools to close in Ireland since mid March) seemingly spend a good portion of your day negotiating parking in stressful conditions, throwing forgotten lunch boxes and hockey sticks out of windows (just me?), organising lifts and regularly getting soaked in a badly timed downpour at the allocated pick up time. Most of us, if we’re honest, think of the school gate routine as just one of the necessary, but less rewarding, parenting tasks.
But here’s the thing: when you consider that a family of three children born over a five year period equates to parents spending 16 years just getting those children through pre-school and primary school, the way you view the school gate should really adjust!
For me once the ‘early years mist’ had cleared and the schedule of pick-ups became less punishing, as a stay at home mum (a reductive term I hate, but it is what we all use) I often struggled to find wider meaning in my role. On dull, dreary days where mundane, repetitive, thankless tasks threatened my sense of self, I questioned if, apart from raising my children, I was contributing anything to society or as a Christian, to God’s loving purpose here on earth. But over the years, as I described to my husband my encounters with other mums at the school gate and how relationships were developing and deepening, he encouraged me to begin seeing this as work for God’s kingdom: quiet, compassionate, holy work that I was increasingly equipped to do.
“The sacred does not merely belong in church, or during times of private or corporate prayer, or to those dressed in clerical collars and robes.”
The sacred does not merely belong in church, or during times of private or corporate prayer, or to those dressed in clerical collars and robes. There is divine possibility everywhere we inhabit and the space we take up is the space we bless; whether it is an office, a supermarket checkout till, a classroom, a building site, a nursing home or a school gate.
Of course I know this but for too long I was prone to separate my life in to unwritten categories of ‘church stuff’ and ‘life stuff’; while in reality as a Christian, all parts of our lives are sacred and holy. Encounter with others is how we express our faith and where the compassion of God bestowed with grace upon us can be shared with those we meet in our daily lives. Encounter was central to Jesus in His earthly ministry and as an itinerant preacher. He often taught His disciples more about the kingdom of God through His interactions with those He met on His journeys, than by His sermons.
In her book The Tenderness of God Gillian T.W. Ahlgren says that, “When done in the conscious presence of the love of God, encounter creates sacred space in the human community. Encounter moves us from observers of life to collaborators with God, in the building up of the human community, the creation of a common home.”
“My research sought to discover if the school gate community can be a sacred place.”
My research sought to discover if the school gate community can be a sacred place, if those who acknowledge the dwelling of God within them see encounter in their everyday lives at the school gate as potentially sacred.
Over a period of a number of months, I read academic books from the ‘everyday religion’ section of the library, which showed me that women’s experiences of religion have long been overlooked and undervalued. So far so unsurprising. US sociologists of religion such as Nancy Ammerman and Meredith McGuire, who formed the backdrop for my research, look at individuals and their experiences and practices, rather than creating mountains of quantitative sociological data focused on affiliation and organisational participation. While their work is wide ranging and fascinating, I discovered that when focusing on women and their spirituality the home or the workplace was addressed but no one had looked at the school gate as a site of spiritual engagement.
Background research completed and armed with the knowledge that this was an under-researched area of spirituality studies, I interviewed five mothers of faith (myself being one of them) on the impact their faith makes on their school gate experience. They all came come from the Protestant tradition and had children who all attend or had attended Church of Ireland primary schools in Dublin.
Eight key themes emerged from these interviews:
school gate dynamics
time
links between the local parish church and the school
personal faith and sources of spirituality
outworking of spirituality at the school gate
stories of encounter
communication
perceived impacts of spirituality at the school gate
The bedrock of my findings established that those interviewed accepted the presence of God within us, and therefore by natural extension, in their everyday lives. This personal spirituality flowed from participation in small group fellowship, private prayer and bible study, church attendance and a love of nature and the outdoors.
The outworkings of spirituality at the school gate were mostly stories of encounter and compassion. From turning up a little bit early so that they were available to chat to someone who had recently been bereaved, to offers of practical help with lifts and food for another mother who is seriously ill, or a simple follow up enquiry of how that tricky situation with a child is progressing; stories of love and care for others were manifold. The use of group and personal texting was almost unanimously viewed as a useful tool for communication and showing care for others, with only one co-researcher preferring to avoid its use in favour of face-to-face interactions.
In the book I feature a number of ‘stories of encounter’ from the school gate. Here is one of them:
I was sitting at the school gate in a new friend’s car and having asked how she was, she burst into tears and told me about her dad, completely out of the blue. Actually, that morning I had been thinking of her and thought I had to go and say hello to her, so I felt led just to talk to her and… I really only listened, I didn’t have advice, I couldn’t do anything to make things better… but she told me about it, and I said I’ll be thinking of her, I’ll pray for her and she told me about a month later that she’d never been able to tell anyone about that and that it meant a lot that I was there on the day. I feel God was in that. He made me think of her that day and I often try and fix things for people and give some advice and I didn’t that day. I think I just knew she needed to talk and there was nothing else I needed to do. I do think God helped me to just keep quiet and listen… and give a hug in the end.
This story exemplifies spirituality at the school gate perfectly, as I see it. A Christian mother who listened to the still small voice of the Holy Spirit and acted upon it was able to provide a non-judgmental, non-intrusive, listening ear to a friend in need by being firstly available to listen, and then being compassionate in her response.
God can and does use us in our encounters in daily life and if you are someone who is (pandemic permitting) regularly standing outside a school gate, I urge you to be more intentional in your interactions there and see how God can show up in that mundane but holy place. From personal experience I promise that it will bring enrichment to both your own spiritual life and the lives of those around you.
If you would like to find out more about Spirituality at the School Gate and read more about the importance of encounter please go to my website: dianejackson.ie for more information and for links to purchase the book from online booksellers.
Diane Jackson lives in Dublin, with her husband and three daughters. Having worked in theatre, event management and as a researcher and writer before having a family, she recently gained a Masters in Applied Spirituality.
