The Shared Vessel: A Parable of Reconciliation
- Public Enemy
- Nov 25
- 3 min read
The shared Vessel falls. Porcelain meets stone, and in an instant what was whole becomes a scatter of sharp-edged fragments. Most would sweep the pieces away, mourning the loss of perfection. But in the Japanese art of kintsugi, the broken vessel is not discarded. It is gathered with reverence. The shards are fitted together with deliberate care, and the cracks are sealed not with clear glue that pretends nothing happened, but with lacquer dusted in powdered gold. The repaired vessel returns to the table more precious than before, its golden veins proclaiming a quiet truth, breakage is not the end, it is the beginning of a new and more honest beauty.
So it is with us As Avians, and indeed as human beings bound by shared purpose, we are not immune to fracture. Harsh words may fly like sudden gusts, pride may rise like a storm, grievances, old and new, may widen into chasms. Discord can erupt between brothers at the highest eyries of leadership or among those who serve in the quiet ranks below. It can even strain the ties we hold with those beyond our fold. In such moments the temptation is to discard what is broken, to walk away from the shards rather than kneel and begin the slow work of mending.
Kintsugi teaches that the fracture is part of the object’s history, not its shame. The gold does not hide the damage, it honors it. The cracks, once sources of weakness, become the very lines that catch the light.
No rift is deeper than the spirit of reconciliation. No wound lies beyond the reach of forgiveness offered sincerely and received with grace.
Let us remember, especially on the coldest nights when bitterness threatens to freeze the heart, that survival itself often depends on choosing to share the fire. A single flame divided warms no one, gathered together, it sustains many lives until dawn.
When we finally sit together again, leaders and newest members, old friends and recent adversaries, and pour into that once-shattered Vessel, something sacred happens. The vessel is no longer flawless, yet it holds more meaning than any perfect one ever could. Its visible seams speak plainly, we were tested, we bled, we chose to heal. The gold-filled cracks become lines of beauty, proof that brotherhood is not the absence of conflict but the courage to repair what conflict has torn. May we always be repairers of the broken vessel.
In every Region, in every chapter, in every encounter within our offices and beyond them, let us be the ones who reach for the glue instead of the broom, who choose understanding over victory, humility over righteousness, and embrace over estrangement.
For when we drink together from the mended vessel, when we pass it hand to hand in love and mutual respect, every sip tastes infinitely sweeter. It carries the flavor of mercy. It warms with the knowledge that what binds us is not perfection, but the willingness to begin again.
Let us guard this fellowship jealously. Let us tend it daily. And let the repaired vessel stand forever on our common table as a quiet, golden reminder:
What has been broken can be made whole and often emerges stronger and more beautiful for having been broken.
To reconciliation. To brotherhood. To the next shared cup.
ACN Media
Aviary Club of Nigeria
Showing understanding towards one another, tolerating our excesses without bias insinuations, loving ourselves unconditionally, learning to forgive and move on, talking with caution and listening with rapt attention are all qualities of brotherhood. 🧢