Faith and technology have met at St. James Episcopal Church in Monkton, where two Scouts, a sculptor and parish leaders combined their talents to transform an outdoor stroll into a spiritual experience.
Eagle Scout Zach Wright, of Sparks, built and installed 14 wooden shrines along a path behind the church. During Lent, they hold sculptures by Alex Hallmark, of Blowing Rock, N.C., depicting the Stations of the Cross.
Debra Donnelly-Barton, director of the Center for Spiritual Development at St. James, wrote and recorded meditations on each station and transferred them to iPods, devices most frequently used to download music from the Internet. And Eagle Scout candidate Chris DiFatta, of Baldwin, made benches and informational signs.
St. James parishioners and visitors are invited to meet the creative team and walk the loop Saturday, March 8, at 9 a.m.
This past February, I had the great honor of attending three Eagle Scout award ceremonies, all from the same troop of which my son is a member (Troop 10, Tallahassee, FL). The work these young men accomplish is absolutely fantastic. One of the requirements of the work project is that it must benefit the COMMUNITY and not the Scout troop. Clearly this meets that requirement. (It’s amazing, too, how many Eagle projects involve benches! Which is a comment also made by the Scout Master at the third presentation.)
It’s nice to see a story like this in the midst of so much negativity.
I admit that when I saw the headline I was skeptical; thinking that this was going to be another one of those MDG things. I was pleasantly surprised. What a wonderful project! And shame on me for always expecting to read something negative.
I love my iPod. Seriously. It rises to the level of agape love 😉