It's rare for children to be hurt by guns at schools. It's rare enough to be big news when it happens. But every day, children are hurt in less tangible ways by the school itself.

A high school senior in Texas made a video game map of his school. As a result, police searched his home and confiscated some decorative swords, he was removed from his school and sent to an "alternative" school for behavior problems, and best of all...

“He was reminded to never again produce a map of any school, or even any public building or area,” the police report said. “He stated that he would comply with this request.”

In case you're wondering, it's not yet illegal to make a 3-D model of a real place. (Even for a game with plasma guns.) The police determined that there was no threat. (Didn't stop them from telling him to curtail his actions, with no right to do so, though.)

However, schools have never been bound by due process. They act "in loco parentis," as parents in their absence, and so they can hand out whatever punishments they like. They perpetuate indignity as a matter of course. They make you ask permission to use the bathroom. They make you go from room to room at the sound of a bell. Think about what they tell you to think about when they tell you to think about it. No reading in math class, no math in art class. And they punish kids for doing things that don't violate any rules.

This is why my children don't go to those places, and never will.

For my whole life, Christian friends have considered me an atheist, and atheist friends have considered me one of those silly religious people. It's taken me decades to be comfortable where I am.

Which leads me to this question. Do you believe in God? A higher power? The Source of All? Your own higher self?

Folks tell me it isn't right to use the word "God" for the ideas I want to express about sacredness. But I figure it's time we reclaimed the word "God" from folks who think they've got "him" all figured out.

 In my heart I know, I've always known, that God is more than a "person" we can define. If we are to take things like "infinite love" seriously, we have to discard lots of the definitions people have used to try to make sense of God since the beginning of written history. How could God become angry? How could God take sides in a conflict? How could God send people to Hell?

As it says in Conversations with God, "You've got Me all wrong."

I made a new friend recently. He's a delightful fella, a steward, a spark of the divine fire (as are you). When he walked me to my car, he made a special effort to check out my bumper-stickers. "Who is this person?" was his explanation.

He found bumper-stickers relating to my kids' sports (was it bmx or track?) and my martial arts, and one I got at the local poetry slam. But he didn't find the answer to his question.

The stickers are all mundane, because I've never found one that got the important thangs just right. And do I really want my message to be stuck to the back of a machine that is, shall we say, not a completely positive view to the future? (In orther words, I have to get rid of that thing, because driving it doesn't feel wonderful. It feels like a compromise with the devil.)

But I have been thinking over the past few days about what a bumper-sticker that was about who I am would say. The only thing I've been able to settle on is a pair of them.

        [ I am a spark of the divine fire. ]      [ So are you. ]

Guess I'll add some cafe-press work to my long list of things to do.