Prop: If you can…a turtle or crustacean in a shell.

Is it alive?

[Have people look at a turtle, or a snail, or perhaps a hermit crab in a shell.]

Can you tell?

Only when you touch it perhaps. Even then, sometimes you may think something is dead and gone, when all of a sudden, life emerges.

Your touch may have awoken it from its sleep. And lo and behold, it’s on its feet!

The power of touch can’t be denied. We all know it. We all need it.

A gentle and loving touch has the ability to connect us warmly in a uniquely human way. Touch makes love tangible and real. Touch puts “teeth” in a declaration and makes it live. Or perhaps I should say instead, touch gives love “bones.”

It’s one thing to say a kind word to someone. But it’s another thing entirely to lay a palm on one’s shoulder, t…