This past weekend I was away with my confirmation class at a retreat at Five Oaks near Paris, Ontario. Being that we were in one place for the weekend (no need to travel), away from commercial shopping centres (no place to shop), and had everything we needed with us (no need to shop) this task seemed pretty easy.
Then lunchtime happened and I knew I had my blog entry.
At the retreat there were just over 40 youth from various United Church congregations in Southwestern Ontario. Typical of many teenagers they loved to chat with one another and they loved to eat. Meal time was very important so when the organizers of the retreat decided to “mess with mealtime” at lunch on Saturday…well, let’s just say there was quite a reaction.
This is what happened. At lunchtime, everyone had to line up. As they neared the front of the line, they had to reach their hands into a bag and pull out a piece of paper that was one of three colours: yellow, red, green. The colour dictated what you would be able to have for lunch.
The largest group of people got the yellow card…probably about 90%. Their lunch consisted of bread. That’s it. To eat their lunch they all had to gather around 2 tables with only 12 spots for sitting, so many had to stand.
The next colour, red, got bread and some salad for lunch. Each person got to sit at a tables. They were a considerably smaller group.
Finally, there were those who got the green cards, the smallest group of all. Their lunch consisted of a full feast—hamburgers and hotdogs with all the trimmings, a few types of salad, water, dessert. They sat at a table set with full linens and silverware. Someone was there to top up their glasses of water when they ran low. They could go up for seconds and thirds if they wanted.
Needless to say many of the teens were not happy…at all. The faces of the youth in my group were sour—particularly those who got the yellow card. They stared at the bread on their plate:
“They’re not allowed to tell me what I can and can’t eat.” “You don’t mess with my food.” “This is stupid.” “They tried something like this at my school and it didn’t go well.” One of our group refused to participate with the card he had picked and went to the green table instead. He was ready to go to battle with anyone who might dare tell him he couldn’t.
I also had picked the yellow card. Most of the kids took no comfort that the majority of us were in the exact same boat.
After everyone had gotten their “lunch,” over top of the grumbles the organizers facilitated a discussion. What had the youth noticed? The majority of people had the least amount of food, and the least amount of space. The red group was thankful for fresh vegetables. The green group had more than they needed, and more than they could possibly eat. In fact, compared to the yellow group the green group looked positively indulgent. Couldn’t the green group share with the rest?
You can probably discern what the exercise was intended to do: get the youth thinking about the world situation and about the disparities that exist between the haves and the have-nots world-wide, to get them to think about the majority of people worldwide who exist on less that $5 a day.
In the end, after the discussion and all the grumbling, everyone got to have a full lunch: hamburgers and hotdogs with all the trimmings, a few types of salad, water, dessert. Small consolation to a disgruntled group. One of my youth said to me, “I wanted lunch, not a lesson.”
He only had to wait ten minutes for lunch—actually he only had to wait ten minutes for a full lunch, he did at least have bread to eat in the meantime—and it was that difficult. Imagine how it must feel for those in our world who never see the kind of lunch that we feel so entitled to.
How privileged we are.
Week of Sundays 
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