Hello Friends!

Welcome to the first edition of the YouthSection eNews for 2009! It has definitely been a busy Christmas and new-year period.

In this first issue we look at some of the inspiring events that have been happening around the world in the last month or so. We also look ahead to some amazing initiatives unfolding during 2009.

eNews will aim to be a shorter and yet more frequent publication in 2009 (this issue is a bit longer because of all that’s happening at the moment!).

eNews is our musical instrument of connection. Throughout the year we hope to hear from (and get to know better) many individuals, initiatives and sections from around the globe - and that means you! So please feel free to contact us at any time, including via email at enewsyouthsectionorg

Best wishes for the year ahead from the YouthSection team in Dornach.

For more, visit us at www.youthsection.org

Please forward this eNews to whoever you think may be interested in YouthSection activities. If you have not yet subscribed and would like to, click here or on the 'subscribe' link above.

North American Initiative Meeting, January 2009

By: From a report by Leslie Loy

Photos: Mathias Bolt Lesniak & Stefan Klocek

As I sit here and think on this past weekend, I find goose bumps crawling up my arms and down my back because something magical happened, something perhaps even historic unfolded in the basement rooms of the Portland Waldorf School…when 20 individuals, each engaged with anthroposophy in his or her own way, come together and hold space with thought, feeling and intention, a new path is created for us all…

…what came together was a powerful group of people committed to a common task: a modern knighthood. Inspired by the flame in one another and by the call of the times to really change the world and to support one another more actively through engagement and interest in one another something was created and held, with the understanding that future work and meetings would be necessary to nourish what was born on this particular weekend. Together we walked away from our gathering with our own mantra, a verse that we can each work with, Karl Konig’s poem on knighthood:

There is a knighthood of the 21st century
Whose riders do not ride through the darkness of physical forests, as
Of old, but through the forest of darkened minds.

They are armed with a spiritual armor,
And an inner sun makes them radiant.

Out of them shines healing,
Healing that flows from the knowledge of the human being as a
Spiritual being.

They must create inner order, inner justice,
Peace, and conviction in the darkness of our time.

They must learn to work side by side with angels.

 - To continue this discussion, and discover many others, please visit www.thenetworkm.net

Midnight Sun Conference, Dornach

By: Martin Stenius

Where can we find a School of Spiritual Science for the youth of today? What could a new form of the school of inner development look like? With these questions in mind, a group of young people from all around the world met first at the initiative meeting and festival forum last summer in Dornach, and again at Michaelmas ("Flame to Flame"). Through the Holy Nights, from December 24 until January 6, between 50 and 100 young people came together to work practically in workshops with eurhythmy, music, text work on Schiller’s aesthetic letters, Steiner’s mystery dramas, nature observations, painting, the Kalevala, ‘The Dream Song of Olav Asteson,’ as well as other discussion groups. Also, some people visited the Christmas Conference at the Goetheanum (running parallel) on the topic of "Art and Initiation," which included the performance of Steiner’s first mystery drama. The next meeting will take place in Dornach over the Easter period, April 3 – April 13.

For more information, or if you have any questions, contact martinyouthsectionorg

Kgotla – Creating Space, January 2009, South Africa

By: Guy Collins

Photos: Melanie Van Zyl

Around 50 people attended the fourth Kgotla conference, held in Durban, South Africa. It was a free and creative gathering in which the form was structured but able to metamorphose. The possibility of forming one’s own experience was refreshing. Five great morning talks were followed by mornings of free initiatives and planning, and afternoons of workshops. The amazing thing was that this was all done on the basis of need, so that workshops were announced every day and only held if there was interest.

Themes brought forward, experienced and discussed: perma-culture and biodynamics, social sculpture, initiation and everyday life, fire blowing and acrobatics, a walk from Namibia to Cape Town to study plant life on the road reserve, blacksmithing, the Mayan calendar and 2011/12, dance, Connectivity 2010, poetry, setting up a community centre for the hearing impaired in Jo’burg, music improvisation and jam sessions, Mother’s Unite/soup kitchen Lavender Hill Cape Town, painting and sculpture, YIP, YouthSection…

All in all an awesome event and experience, once again reminding me of the creativity of Africans of all shades, and the need for focus that is so necessary to bring this creativity to fruition.

For more on Kgotla, visit www.kgotla.za.org

New Zealand Youth Gathering

By: From a report with words and photos by Rosa Henderson

This January, on the beautiful Kaipti Coast in New Zealand, 28 energetic young people and eight experienced wise ones, arrived to form something quite unique. It was a gathering that was run for youth, by youth, and was held at Te Ra Waldorf School, where lovely and generous staff opened their arms and facilities to us. The themes that we discussed and work-shopped were centred around freedom and responsibility, and for five days we worked in the realms of thinking, feeling and willing…  

                   
When I think of the event, words and concepts that come to mind are; community, sharing, discovering, caring, freedom, forgiveness, creating bridges, warmth, energy, learning from the land, creative outlets, individuality, choice, respect, responsibility and the spaces between us.

For more from YouthSection New Zealand, including updates on the winter (mid-year conference) and the full version of this article, visit www.anthroposophy.org.nz/node/89

The Connect Conference, April 2009, Goetheanum

By: Katha, Caitlin, Che

The fourth Connect Conference will take place April 19 – 23, 2009. 12th grade classes from 21 Waldorf schools worldwide are invited and challenged to shape this conference together with the YouthSection and active people from our network.  12th graders will give presentations about their yearly projects, and exhibit them in the Goetheanum. The exhibition and evening performances will be open to the public – and this means you!

Active people from the YouthSection network will offer conversation groups on the topic of “Society and Its Contemporary Challenges,” and inspiring individuals will give impulse-lectures on their way of carrying responsibility. The night program will be filled by theatre productions and cultural presentations from around the world.

The Connect Conference will be a space where we can imagine and practice a society in which everyone carries responsibility. Every participant has an important role in shaping the Connect Conference and in shaping society as a whole! Our goal is to create a living picture in which it is evident that each of us is both a participant and contributor in all that we do.

The Connect Conference marks the transition from a time of learning about oneself to orienting oneself within society. We want to acknowledge and celebrate this and reflect together how our common background of Waldorf education has shaped our biographies.

As young people who care about the world, it is our aim to raise awareness of a shared future that we can and must co-create. We hope to open eyes and show possibilities and ways to become active.  We want to encourage each person to take on the responsibility that needs to be carried.

For more information, visit www.connectconference.org

What We're Listening To

“Kaspar” http://www.myspace.com/kasparband

"Gosia Basinska" http://www.myspace.com/gosiabasinska

What We're Reading

"Concerning the Reliance which may be Placed on Thinking..." in Rudolf Steiner's The Threshold of the Spiritual World.

Website We're Surfin'

No surprises: it's NetworkM!