House News

Last Friday Belle Prairie joined together in prayer as a community to remember and celebrate the importance of connection in our lives.  As social animals, humans need each other.  We need to feel supported, valued, and loved.  Those who have good relationships are happier, healthier, and live longer than those who report feeling lonely. We often think of connecting with others as having heart-to-heart talks where we share our deepest thoughts and emotions or open up about hard-to-discuss feelings or events in our lives.  This is certainly connecting and is important for us all to do at times, but connections can also be as simple as a walk.  A pleasant interaction with a store clerk, a shared laugh-out-loud joke, even a text message to a family member can all, to some degree, satisfy our innate need for community.

In Romans 12 we are reminded to “Love one another with brotherly affection”;to connect with our brothers and sisters – even the ones you struggle to like – and build relationships; to connect and love!  The puzzle installation, created by each member of the house, is a strong symbol for us and our community about connection and the importance of connecting to self, others, and creation.  It also symbolises each of as an individual puzzle piece, with a unique assortment of tabs (the protruding bumps) and blanks (the holes that fall between the tabs).  Those tabs and blanks represent a person's idiosyncrasies: likes and dislikes, character traits, goals, and so forth.  When we look for relationships, we hope to find someone whose own 'tabs and blanks' fit with ours.  Whilst a piece may not always fit, there will always be some form of connection.  We are all unique and when we come together, just like this puzzle, we form a beautiful tapestry of relationships and community.

Elise Cohen

House Guardian