Reflecting on the Morning Verse

«Do I have to say the morning verse?» a new student in the lower school asked me. «No, you don't have to. It's important to me, but it's not compulsory. At the beginning, we create a space that supports us all. You're welcome to wait.» The second time, of course, he joined in.

At an anthroposophical conference in California I once witnessed a conversation among former students: « ... and when I was in a very bad way, and I was at the bottom, I remembered this saying: The sun with loving light ... » And about ten years ago, students at a school in the Ruhr area spontaneously stood in a circle before their verbal exams and said: «I look inte the world ...» to overcome their excitement.

I started the lesson with my class in a circle of cushions on the floor, close together until Easter in the sixth grade, until the beginning of adolescence.  We would then stand up, hold hands and wait for silence and start together with «I ... » as long as the intimacy carried us. This carrying stopped at some point in seventh grade, although the view outwards and inwards of «into the world» and «into the soul» was raised in consciousness depending on the era. We spoke our class slogan because it carried us and united us until the morning verse, then in other languages, fitted again.

I'm involved in preparing teachers for the Berlin Senate's decision to make them permanent and I see lessons in many subjects. Again and again I hear: «... if it weren't for the word God in the morning verse!» So I have helped to build a bridge, be it an inner one on the way to attitude, be it an outer one by replacing a word or speaking a part for the upper school in my mind. My soul vibrates and a spirit-borne field is created. When teachers at the beginning of their careers feel that they don't have to force themselves, they breathe a sigh of relief. Isn't this exactly the kind of relief we want to encourage? Breathing a sigh of relief in being supported within a community?

Parallel forms of morning verses have long since developed at our schools. One mentee reported that she had heard in the seminar that it could also be any other saying at the beginning, chosen by her. Imperceptibly, the two traditional morning verses have become a yardstick between conviction, authenticity and the urge for renewal within our pedagogy. There is still the «Catholic» version with arms crossed in front of the chest, squeezing the breath. There is the laissez-faire style, where it is up to each learner to decide whether they want to check in in the morning and join in. And then there is the silent and soundless disappearance of the morning verse in the upper school.

In a culture in which it is no longer easy to share a sandwich because of the gluten, the carbohydrates, the non-vegan toppings, the time of day and the grain itself, sharing a religiously tinged saying can no longer be taken for granted. And: «The sun with loving light  ...» no longer goes without saying. What is «light»? What is spiritual power? An army full of heroes? What are links? Those of a chain? Does the effectiveness of images require their linguistic understanding? The bridge between my own attitude towards the verse and the inner image in the adolescents that I want to nurture requires a conversation at all levels: within the teaching staff in search of a common attitude or, quite courageously, a common modified form, and with the children and young people about how we want to come together in the morning. Such a conversation is a question of the image of humanity: do I see children as self-empowered beings with their own, valuable view of the world that «make the difference»? We can talk to the class about what this verse means to me or to Waldorf schools around the world and the originator. At the latest, we can invite the youth to help shape it and thus raise awareness of the supporting pillar of a common spirituality.

Keeping something alive requires us educators to be constantly ready for change, for inner movement and for exploring possibilities and variations in order to create access for as many people as possible. We have to prove ourselves in the fear of rigidity on the one hand and arbitrariness on the other.

I have to admit that, as an enthusiastic and tireless morning verse reciter, I have already been thinking about new lines in catchy language – while maintaining the basic tone.