Themes, Beauty, and Brokenness.

And so it begins again, that reoccurring summer Service-Learning Center angst around what this year’s StreetFest theme will be. After much deliberation on the part of Rebecca, our StreetFest coordinator, and a brainstorming session or two, we seem to be circling in on a few possibilities.

Interestingly, as we have been discussing the possibilities for this year’s theme, one of the topics that has come up a number of times is the beauty of/in brokenness.

Is there something beautiful about brokenness, brokenness experienced on both individual and societal levels? If so, what is it that makes brokenness beautiful? Is it the “stuff” born of brokenness that is beautiful or is beauty inherent to brokenness itself? What does the relationship between beauty and brokenness have to do with service-learning or, more specifically, StreetFest?

We are hoping to start a discussion about the relationship between beauty and brokenness in the comments section below; please feel free to join in the discussion with your own thoughts, comments, or questions.