Dear Friends,

God’s Grace is Gentle.

In my morning reading, I found several writings based on Gentleness and Grace. These are such beautiful virtues to embody and share with others. Have you ever met someone who is huge/tall in body and yet gentle in spirit? Sometimes we call them “Gentle Giants.” I love the idea of being a gentle giant. One does not have to be tall or large in stature to be a giant of gentleness. Who have you met or known over the years who has treated you with extra kindness, compassion and caring. That person is a gentle giant. Giant in heart, mind, soul and body.

God is that Giant of Grace and Gentleness, and God lives and moves and has ITS being within us, as us. Therefore we are the giants, grace and gentleness of God. It is our true Self. We can choose to display Gentleness and Grace everyday of our lives. Every action and thought is a choice we make. We can get angry with ourselves and others or we can gently listen and speak words of graceful kindness.

I am presently teaching a class on “Beliefs, Comparisons and Customs of the World Religions,” through Emerson Theological Institute. I have one student and we are beginning to zoom our class. We met twice to get to know one another and to go over the syllabus to be sure everything was understood. Last week was our first class with a paper due that day. My student is a gentleman in his 50’s who immigrated to the U.S. 25 years ago so English is his second language. After talking with him and getting to know him, his background and faith I was impressed with his cheerful disposition and excitement about taking this class. I read his paper before our class and it was excellent. I was impressed his writing in English was so good, however there was a problem. As good as his writing was, he had not included “cites” where he got his material. Most of it was from Steve’s Interfaith Manual (IM) and our Interfaith Workbook(IW.) These are the text books, however I know he must have looked at other references, which I encourage. I also found two sentences taken directly from the Interfaith Workbook, without quotes or cite. In a normal college class, it might be considered plagiarizing.

I thought, how do I handle this situation? I reflected on God’s Gentle Grace. When I talked with him I immediately told him his paper was excellent! I was impressed with how well he wrote in English. I could tell he was happy with the complement. I asked if he got all his information from the IM and IW. He said no because he went on line to find out more information. I told him I love it when students go above and beyond what reading is expected of them. I applauded him for his initiative. Then I said, “For the future, would you please give the cites in your paper, so I know where you got your information. If it came only from the IW or IM you can just put that down. I said, “I also noticed a couple sentences taken directly from the IW.” He said he couldn’t write it better than that. I laughed and he laughed too. I said “Thank you, I appreciate that,” and it is important to put quotes around any sentence that is not yours.

I said, “I am glad this came up, because I will also include this information in the syllabus to remind students to always cite their references. I told him he helped me. I told him I would send him an email with examples on how to cite references. And them we went on to discus other relevant ideas pertaining to the first class.

I believe I handled the situation with Grace and Gentleness. I really wanted my student to enjoy the class as well as write papers correctly. I kept watching his reactions and I felt he was able to receive my comments without feeling demeaned. To me this was a teachable moment. Before the class I had said a quiet prayer knowing all was in Divine order and kindness. And it was!

I will continue to strive to speak gentle words with grace in my comments and interactions as I teach. Today, remember, ALL situations are teachable and can be handled with GOD’S GRACE AND GENTLENESS.

“Only the weak are cruel. Gentleness can only be expected from the strong.” -Leo Buscaglia

Gently Teaching, Abigail