Youth Peace Advocate: Camp Mack

Being the Youth Peace Advocate at Camp Alexander Mack was a very different experience than doing it anywhere else this summer. Camp Mack is my home camp, where I’ve been attending in some form for twenty-three years. Everywhere else I am Nolan, this year’s Youth Peace Advocate. At Camp Mack I am Nolan, the former camper/CIT/councilor/Ministry Summer Service intern who most people have known forever and is the Youth Peace Advocate this year. It was good to be home.

During the week I was primarily working with the Followers and Splash camps. Both were for campers of Jr. High age. The team leaders (the same role as deans at almost every other camp) for Splash camp were my parents, Rosalie and Ryan McBride, which combined with my brother and sister working summer staff meant my entire family was at Camp Mack last week. After about a month of traveling across the country it was good for us all to be together. Additionally, I knew several other staff members of both camps, so it was very different to begin the week knowing so many people.

My daily schedule and responsibilities as the Youth Peace Advocate were also different. While exactly what was expected of me was different at each new place, all the camps before this week had explicitly set aside time for me lead my own sessions with the campers during the week. At Camp Mack both sets of team leaders already had schedules set up, and I was invited to participate and bring what I’ve put together into their plans as much or as little as I wanted. The Splash Camp leaders did explicitly ask me to lead a tour of the Brethren history murals in Quinter-Miller auditorium. Painted in 1949, the murals tell this history of the Church of the Brethren up to then, and include the artist’s prediction up to the 300th anniversary in 2008. A newer mural of more recent Brethren history was created in 2000. The murals have long been one of my favorite parts of camp, and I was excited to get to share about them. Of course, me being a History and Religious Studies major whose era of emphasis is the early modern period, this was kind of a dangerous thing to ask of me. Having recently studied the origins of the Pietist movement which shaped the Brethren movement, I might have spent a little longer than intended on “historical context.” (Hey, to understand the Brethren’s break with the state churches you need to know about the relationship between church and state in the middle ages, which means you need to know about Constantine, and so on.)

I also went boating twice with Splash Camp: kayaking Tuesday in Goshen and sailing Thursday on Lake Michigan. It was a great time, even if I fell into the river kayaking and took at least ten minutes trying to get back in.

The word of the day for the fifth day of camp is “heiwa,” a Japanese word meaning “balance.” The scripture is Mark 12:28-31, the two greatest commandments. I usually start my session for this day by asking the kids to play a game where they stand in a circle with one person being “it.” That person chooses another in the circle whom they attempt to make laugh any way short of touching them. If the laugh, they are now “it.” Afterwards I ask the campers how it was to try and not laugh, what techniques they used, and if they think it would be easier if they practiced this game every day. We then discuss the importance of practice in peacemaking, using the Civil Rights movement as an example, and the Christian life more generally. I play a section from the first episode of the Episcopal Church’s Way of Love podcast (11:38-17:36).[1] It is an interview with the denomination’s Presiding Bishop Michael Curry, who recently made headlines around the world for his sermon on love at last year’s royal wedding. Bishop Curry uses the metaphors of firefighter/first responder springing into action or an athlete training for their sport to talk about how practices such as prayer, Bible study, gathering for public worship, and others mold us to be more like Jesus, so we live out his call without having to think about it. It becomes our instinctual reaction. After discussing the main points of the interview, I ask the campers to list the practices we have been following at camp that mold us to be peacemakers and help us live more like Jesus. After we have a good list going, I challenge the campers to consider how they can incorporate these practices into their daily lives.

Redeeming God, We thank you that we are fearfully and wonderfully made and accepted and loved by you not because of anything we have done, but because of your very nature. Grant that through our life we may be drawn closer to you and molded into the image of your son, our savior, Jesus.

In His name we pray,

Amen


[1] https://wayoflove.episcopalchurch.org/episodes/season/1/episode/1

YPTT 2013 at Camp Mack!

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Camp Mack was such an accommodating and hospitable place to begin our summer’s travel. The camp focuses on reconnecting with various parts of nature from it’s lakefront activities, to rock walls and ropes courses, to a labyrinth, archery range, and trails all-the-while keeping up with modern commodities. We’re all trying vegetarianism, so we loved the cooks who provided a vegetarian option to all the meals! Mack had four camps of different age groups here at the same time throughout the week and it was lovely meeting everyone, participating in activities together, and experiencing God in a beautiful place. During some of the Morning News times (a Mack tradition), Curt Rowland enthusiastically presented a “Top 10 Reasons Why _____ Should Come Back to Camp Mack” list for the camp that would leave later that day so here is our “Top 10 Reasons Why the Youth Peace Travel Team Should Come Back to Camp Mack”

10. Experience yurt life.

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9. Re-join the Straw Hat Band at opening campfire.

8. Get splashed in the face at Water Carnival.

7. See a swan and a great blue heron fly over the lake

6. Play toilet tag

5. Row to rock island

4. Play in the Arky Parky

3. Get egg and hot sauce smeared in your beard

2. Dance to “Be Our Guest” dressed as giant silverware, Lumiere, Cogsworth, Belle, and the Beast.

1. Seek God in all things new with amazing campers, counselors, and staff!

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Youth Peace Travel Team 2012 orientation

2012 YPTT

2012 Youth Peace Travel Team

Explorer
Fun
Enthusiastic
Happy

Upon our arrival to Camp Mack for Youth Peace Travel Team orientation, we each chose one of these words as a short self-descriptor and as a way to get to know one another. These words became formative in helping us to better know ourselves, what concepts of peace we stand for, and how we can combine them into how we act and carry out our lives.

As we spent our time in close community over the three days, we have truly become a team who is able to support one another in our growth in these aspects, and we are truly excited to spread peace as our summer journey begins! Peace!