Vacation Bible Kids

“Dear Sean,” the email began. “I teach vacation Bible school… Last year we had three Latino children whose parents are undocumented immigrants…

“Church leadership felt it best not to allow these children to attend VBS this year. It broke my heart, the kids don’t understand, I’m really struggling with this decision. What should I do?”

Dear Anonymous, I can’t tell you what to do. And I can’t tell you what to think. What I can tell you, is a story.

Our tale begins in Philadelphia, 12 years after the Civil War. Nineteenth-century Philly was a rough place to live. “The City of Brotherly Love” had degenerated into “The City of ‘You Suck.’”

A little background. Riots had been occurring all over town. There were labor riots, anti-Irish riots, anti-Catholic riots, riots between Blacks and Whites, riots between German and Italians.

There was even a city-wide riot over which Bible translation schools should use, which resulted in a school being burned down. Churches were burned, too. Places of business were torched. People were being killed all the time. Not pretty.

Philadelphia was a giant “melting pot,” only a few miles from the Mason-Dixon line. So after the war the population of Black Americans rose from four percent to nearly 20.

Also, Irish immigrants were arriving, literally, by shiploads; 750,000 Irish refugees entered America during this period. Philadelphia had the largest population of Irish immigrants in the country.

Pretty soon, 2 million of Philadelphia’s residents were foreign-born immigrants. During this era, the city population would double in a span of only 30 years. It was the perfect storm.

Nobody was getting along. Every day featured brawling in the pubs, fighting in the schools, deaths in the streets.

Enter Reverend Clarence Herbert Woolston.

Let’s call him “Herb.” Herb was a kindly white-haired minister who looked like everyone’s favorite grandpa. He’d been a preacher at East Baptist for almost 40 years. He was a quirky guy, extremely funny, a sleight-of-hand magician, and a great speaker.

He was NOT like any preacher you’ve ever seen. Herb used visual props and magic tricks in each sermon. Sometimes he used circus animals for various object lessons.

It was not unusual to walk into Herb’s church and see him holding a bear cub or a tiny leopard. Or perhaps you’d see the Reverent pulling quarters out of some parishioner’s ear.

He even wrote a detailed book on how to use magic tricks during sermons. Once, a traveling performer passing through Philadelphia bought a copy of Herb’s book and deemed it to be his favorite. That performer was named Harry Houdini.

Needless to say, Reverend Herb was extremely popular in the “kid community.” All the children clambered to see his sermons. Children would wander into the church, off the streets, dressed in rags, sitting elbow to elbow, mesmerized by sleight-of-hand tricks, cute animals, and Herb’s sense of humor.

Now with all this in mind, I’d like you to imagine this scenario:

One Sunday morning, several street children enter Herb’s sanctuary. All skin colors. All nationalities. German children, Irish children, a group of Jewish boys, Black children, Hungarian kids, Italian kids, and many children who haven’t bathed. They are all sitting together on the front row, watching the old man deliver his sermon.

And something happens.

Mid-sermon, Herb notices regular parishioners scooting away from the street children. Other members of his congregation are storming out of the building.

Next Sunday, same thing happens. Street children of different races, creeds, and levels of poverty, enter the building, crowding to see the magician, but local parents are snatching their children away from the riff raff.

Herb is so grieved by this, he stays up late one evening, writing a song. As a stroke of irony, he steals the melody from the anthem, “God Save Ireland.” He introduces this song the following Sunday.

The Reverend teaches this song to the children in the congregation. All the adults watch as the old man weeps when he hears the choir of tiny voices sing his lyrics.

The following are the original lyrics to his song:

“Jesus loves the little children,

“All the children of the world,

“Red and yellow, Black and white,

“They are precious in his sight,

“Jesus loves the little children of the world.”