SDC

Whew! I have just come home from a weekend Spirituality Development Conference, also known as SDC. SDC is designed for Youth in my church, primarily those who are members of the YRUU(Young Religious Unitarian Universalists). This was kind of a last minute thing for me. When we found out the date, the other adviser could not attend, because he was going to be out of town, and I was previously unavailable. When I bacame available, I did not follow up, because I presumed that he had found someone else to go.

He hadn't. I got the notice on the date of the "deadline" and signed up right away. I put that in quotes because I know of people that signed up the day before the event, almost a week after I did.

On Friday of last week, I was thinking that I should probably ditch, but I couldn't figure out how, since I was the driver. I'm glad that I didn't. The first thing that they had us do was to write the stresses of our everyday lives on a baggage tag (ie this was the baggage that we were bringing with us) and they had us check them. For all that it was a simple mental trick, it was very effective. As we were doing introductions, we were asked to list a high and a low from the past week. My high was checking my baggage. This got a laugh from the whole room.

So what do you do at SDC? SDC isn't about increasing your own spirituality, but about teaching you to lead worships yourselves. Personal spiritual growth will likely come as a side effect of leading worships, but this conference didn't generate that growth directly. That said, I helped lead 2 worships, and participated in 6.

SDC is not a rally. It is much, much more about the work. Even so, we do have free time. Before sessions start in the morning, over meals, and during the infrequent breaks, or while walking back from the one location or another around the retreat center. And then there were the Ice Breaker games. Lot's of time to get to know each other, or to reacquaint yourself with each other. And of course attending the sessions did not preclude cuddle puddles from forming in the evening.

Also, unlike a rally, there were showers. We were ALL thankful for that. And the camp food was remarkable. My only regret, as far as the food went, was that I hadn't elected a vegetarian menu for myself. While not a vegetarian myself, I am told that the vegetarian meals that the chef at the retreat center cooks are fabulous. I was actually envious of their meals a couple of times. Don't get me wrong, the omnivore meals were great too. Actually, the worst part was sleeping in a bunk bed in a camp dorm. The mattresses were thin, and they creaked every time someone rolled over.

So, what do 12 youth and 8 adults do for worships, when some are pagan, some agnostic, many are atheist, and many were seeking answers? Some of the worships turned inside, seeking to find understanding of and from our own nature. Most focused on the community, on sharing, on interconnectedness. Most of these worships were circle worships, which helped to strengthen the sense of community, by having everyone see each others face during the worship, and encouraging everyone to participate and share.

I'm glad I didn't ditch. It was fun.