Amaris

Yesterday. Children's Ministry. We workers and a little Indian girl named Amaris.

It was a battle royal.

For the past six weeks this child has chained her poor parents to her side with screaming, so that one or the other of them is forced to sit with her in Children's Ministry throughout the Sunday service. In a way I admire her persistence and single-mindedness. She has the finesse of an artist in giving tantrums. Amaris also has the face of a fawn (right down to her large, liquid-brown, black-lashed eyes) and the suspicious nature of a gangster-lord from the 1920's. During the first few weeks she would not so much as allow a Children's Ministry worker to touch her hand or offer her a cracker. I have never seen such an untrusting child.

We tried once or twice to keep her and let her cry a little in hopes that she would calm down, thus allowing her parents to stay in the meeting. Always, she has outlasted us. Yesterday, our numbers being managable and she no longer having the excuse of finding us or our room to be unusual surroundings, I suggested to her father that we try it again. He eventually agreed, handed her over, and departed as the tantrum began.
And what a tantrum it was. We agreed amongst ourselves that, since her crying had improved by some degrees over the weeks and she was no longer likely to choke or make herself actually sick, we would try to wait her out and break her of the notion that she could get what she wanted by crying for it. We therefore endured a solid twenty-five minutes of wholehearted (but not desperate or dangerously passionate) tantrum.

I held her, but all of us behaved as if she were not crying at all. I conversed with the other children and turned over books and toys for my own amusement (I have learned that it is no use trying to amuse a really determinedly crying child with toys, as this will only encourage them by lending attention to their designedly miserable state).

Sometimes I put her down when the crying grew worse, to signify my displeasure with her tears. She would run after me across the room when I did this, screaming to be picked up. Which I did, putting her down again when her cries rose in volume. All this went on for some time and she sobbed single-mindedly throughout. I tell you, I had to admire her. It is not often that I meet a creature as absolutely stubborn as myself.

Eventually she began to grow very tired with crying, and we agreed that, though we should very much like to win the battle, and thus the war, it wasn't worth it to let her make herself sick after all. So we finally gave up and took her down the hall to the office to have her parents called. The moment I set foot outside the gate with Amaris in my arms, she stopped crying. I was not surprised; she had known all along exactly what she wanted, and how to get it. Now that she saw her demands were about to be met, she ceased. Besides she really was tired of crying, poor child.

"You know what you're after," I said to her, "and you know you've won."

But then as we went down the hall, I wondered to myself... had she won? When we got to the office I asked those in charge whether it was permissible for me to walk Amaris about the halls, provided that this would quiet her and that I would be accompanied at all times by another Children's Ministry worker (as per the regulations). They told me that this was not only allowed, but desirable in order that the parents might remain in the meeting if possible.

I secured another worker who was willing to walk about with me, and we began the experiment. By now my arms ached with long holding, and by now Amaris, suspicious as she is, had grown so exhausted that she actually suffered herself to lean against me. We paced the halls slowly, I waiting uneasily for her to realize that her parents were not about to appear and take her away from all this vale of tears.

To my surprise, she did not start up again even after it must have become clear to her that her parents were not around the next corner. Instead she was actually quiet as my fellow worker and I talked quietly in the old lobby, or walked slowly up and down the halls. I don't mind telling you, I was shocked. She remained quiet, and even relaxed more and more in my arms, until it was nearly time for the parents to come get their children. We took her back to our room, fully expecting the tears to begin afresh. But they did not. Amaris sat (I might even say "reclined") in my lap absolutely quietly for the last ten minutes until her father came to get her, all but asleep in my arms.

We permitted ourselves a quiet round of congratulations after she had gone. Amaris the unconquerable had actually stayed in Children's Ministry, without either parent, for the period of an entire church service. Not only this but she was actually quiet and relatively peaceable for almost half of it.

I came home exhausted, but elated. When I went back for the second service and heard how excellent the sermon was, and reflected that her parents, visitors, had gotten to hear all of it, I was even more grateful that we had persevered. I don't know what next week will bring: perhaps a repeat tantrum, perhaps not. But I believe that we have won an important battle, and may yet win the war.

After she had gone, I wondered what connection there might be between the tantrums of a little girl and the spiritual tantrums of grown people like myself. How often, I thought, have I been an Amaris? Especially, how many times have I refused all comfort because I preferred to wallow in misery, or in the memory of how others have ill-used me?

It was a highly instructive morning.