Teachable moments... or maybe not

We have an action figure Jesus.  Joanne's had it since before we got married.  I think it started as a joke.  He came with a blue cardboard cutout of water and he has wheels on the bottom so you can roll him across the blue cardboard and watch him "walk on water."  We kept him because it was kitchy and fun.   Now as the boys play with him and all the other action figures, I make sure they know this is not the Jesus we pray to.

Tonight, the Joker, (Batman's nemesis from a Happymeal) and Swiper, (the swiping fox from Dora the Explorer - and I can't believe I'm writing about this...) were wreaking more havoc than usual.  Usually I try to make sure these trouble makers get put in jail - such is much of the adventure of playtime.  But tonight Joker and Swiper had succeeded in putting all the other toys in the jail, and there was no one left to set them free... then I spied the Jesus on the shelf.

I said that I knew someone who could set them free, because that's his favourite thing to do, and I brought out the Jesus, and I tried to make it a teachable moment as I was using the Jesus toy to set all the other toys free and explain that Jesus, the real one, does this for all of us... and I was hoping some of this was actually getting through as I "rescued" the last of the toys.

Then the boys used their Swiper and Joker toys, grabbed Jesus, and gleefully crammed him in the jail, and victoriously looked at me as if to say, "Now what?"  And all I can think is... maybe I should have just left Jesus on the shelf.

-A.