For the past four years Anne has presented workshops for students in Catholic High Schools. The perennial one has been for Grade 10 students, entitled THE BODY IS THE TEMPLE OF THE SOUL. Students participate in a great variety of activities from the initial breath meditation to brain-storming : “What could you not do if you didn’t have a body?”, to improvisations dealing with emotions. They experiment with imposing positive and negative messages on each other. This leads to the qualities of the Soul, to trying to define the “Soul”, to considering heroes in our lifetime who have lived these qualities( such as faith, hope, love, trust, courage, humor, compassion) from Nelson Mandela to Theresa of Calcutta, to Martin Luther King Jr. to Jean Vanier.
Students investigate their own values by which they live their daily lives; they experience the wonder of guided imagery into outer space in their kinesthetic bodies. Once they are back on earth and have lunch they participate in a frank discussion about sexuality. The goal is to help them realize that their sexual energy is involved in all creative and courageous acts, in all manner of activity in addition to sexual intercourse.
Anne talks here about saints like John of the Cross and Mother Theresa who would never have succeeded as they had without the transmutation of that incredible energy into a passion to do God’s will. Students learn about eunuchs; they consider how t.v. ads and some shows manipulate them in sexual ways; they come to an awareness that their decisions are often made unconsciously, depending on their “mood”. The goal here is to help them realize how unique and precious their body is, as the temple of their soul. The day ends with a liturgy, a song and a dance.