'Tis Almost Fairy Time

"When the first baby laughed for the first time, the laugh broke into a thousand pieces and they all went skipping about, and that was the beginning of fairies."
                                                                                                       J. M. Barrie

 

 

 

 

 

"I felt in my bones; first, that this world does not explain itself. It may be a miracle with a supernatural explanation; it may be a conjuring trick, with a natural explanation. But the explanation of the conjuring trick, if it is to satisfy me, will have to be better than the natural explanations I have heard. The thing is magic, true of false. Second, I came to feel as if magic must have a meaning, and meaning must have some one to mean it. There was something personal in the world, as in a work of art; whatever it meant it meant violently. Third, I thought this purpose beautiful in its old design, in spite of its defects, such as dragons."
                                                                                        - G. K. Chesterton

 

 

 

"Since it is so likely that children will meet cruel enemies, let them at least have heard of brave knights and heroic courage."

 

                                                                                   - C.S. Lewis

 

 

 

"I have explained that the fairy tales founded in me two convictions; first, that this world is a wild and startling place, which might have been quite different, but which is quite delightful; second, that before this wildness and delight one may well be modest and submit to the queerest limitations of so queer a kindness."

                                                                                                           - G. K. Chesterton

 

 

"'That is what makes life at once so splendid and so strange. We are in the wrong world. When I thought that was the right town, it bored me; when I knew it was wrong, I was happy. So the false optimism, the modern happiness, tires us because it tells us we fit into this world. The true happiness is that we don't fit. We come from somewhere else. We have lost our way.'"

                                                                                                     G.K. Chesterton

"I laid out the laws of reality. Butterflies and lightning do not strike twice. And then God spoke.

'Do you see this man? He said to my son. 'He is your father. Do not believe a word he says.'

The second time the butterfly landed on his arm.

How many lies have I told him? I and the world both. I have repented now. I no longer tell him that he can't touch the moon from my shoulders. I tell him to stretch, and I offer to run and jump. There may be a dragon in the mulberries. I make sure to check. And I look for fish under the couch."

                                                                                                    - N. D. Wilson

"This is exactly the message that fairy tales get across to the child in manifold form: that a struggle against severe difficulties in life is unavoidable, is an intrinsic part of human existence - but that if one does not shy away, but steadfastly meets unexpected and often unjust hardships, one masters all obstacles and at the end emerges victorious."

                                                                                             - Bruno Bettelheim

Sometimes you just need to invite a dozen church children over to make sure they have not forgotten about the unseen - that to possess the unseen is to possess everything. And that is faith.


- Millie