St. Mark's, Warrenpoint - Year 14

Yesterday we had our final group of the year from St. Mark's Warrenpoint. They were Year 14 which is such a busy year in school that it was good to get away from the busyness and just take time to reflect on it all!

We had great discussion in the groups about faith and God and Jesus and whether we feel the need of them in our lives. We did a meditation on Jeremiah 29:11 and everyone took some time to think ahead to the hopes and dreams they have for their future and some happy memories from their past.

Everyone took time to write a positive message to everyone else in the group in an Affirmation Booklet which is a lovely thing to keep in a memory box and read every so often to remind yourself of all the qualities that others see in you.

For the prayer service we set up a focus saying the word LOVE. The "O" of the word was a ring that each person then attached a piece of paper to, with their special intentions written on it. It symbolised how each of us can support each other by praying for each other.

The songs the group chose to play were, "Man in the Mirror" by Michael Jackson and "True Colours" by Cindi Lauper.

We had a really lovely day with them and hope it was a day that they will remember and that their Affirmation Booklets will bring a smile to their faces many times in the years ahead.

God Bless!

St. Joseph's, Crumlin - Primary 7 Transition Retreat

We had the first of four primary 7 groups in from St. Joseph's in Crumlin this week. They were here for their Transition Retreat where we talk and pray about the move from primary to post-primary school. (Normally we would wait until all four groups from a school had been to the centre before publishing a blog, but as the last group isn't coming until May we decided to post up each group as they come.)

We talked about our memories of our time in primary school and our hopes and dreams, worries and fears about post-primary school. It was lovely to hear some of the happy memories that people remembered of their time at primary school. It's lovely to remember those times and feel that happiness all over again. Some people even remembered their first day of school and the first people they talked to in the class.

We talked about the path of our life so far and made a footprint to symbolise our journey along that path. During the prayer service we placed our footprints on the cloth path which we put down as our focus. As you can see below, it has a fork in the road to show the different schools people will be going to.

We made Friendship cards so that everyone in the class could sign their name on everyone else's card, which is a lovely way to remember all the people in your class after you move on to post-primary school. You can see some of these in the picture below.

During the prayer service we sang a great song called "Peace Like a River." It has loads of actions and everyone enjoyed it.

Some lovely prayers were written for the prayer service...

Dear God,
Thank you for the food we eat. Amen.
Dear God, please protect the people in Haiti from the earthquakes .Amen.
Dear God, thank you for all my awesome friends.
Amen.

Dear God, I want to pray for people in poor countries who are sick and I want to thank sport relief who raised money for them, and I want to thank God for the things that we use everyday and people in some countries have to starve and sometimes they die.
Amen.

Dear God,
Bless the people in Ireland that have no food or shelter and also have no one to talk to.
We are also thankful for our school and an opportunity for education.
Lord hear us.

Dear God,
Bless all the people in Haiti and Chile after the earthquakes and take care of the children with no parents or no place to sleep or nothing to eat. Also bless the people who are in hospital very ill with diseases. Thank you for having medicines to care and make us better.
Lord hear us.

Dear God,
I thank you for everything you have given us - shelter, food and the people who love us.
Let us think of those who are less fortunate than ourselves.
We take a moment to think of the people who have passed away.
Lord hear us.

As you can see from these prayers these young people had great consideration for others and gratitude for all the blessings in their own lives.

We look forward to meeting the next group.

St. Patrick's Keady continued...

It's been a pleasure to work with the remainder of the Year 9 groups from St. Patrick's in Keady. Through the days we talked about many things relating to life and faith. They had great ideas and opinions and there was such a variety of original ideas for the liturgy each day.

A group did this beautiful focus of a boat for their prayer service. It represents the voyage of life. Inside it they put all the boxes that they made, which symbolised that we're all on the voyage together..."all in the same boat," as it were.

They placed the simple prayer of the Breton Fisherman beneath the boat, which reminds us that we can call on Jesus to calm all the storms in our lives.

We loved this acrostic reflection because it is our wish here in the Centre that everyone who comes on Retreat will find it INTERESTING!

This beautiful poster speaks for itself! To do this we need to grow in self-awareness and really think about how we treat those around us.

Everyone who comes to the centre experiences a meditation, either Ignation or Scripture based. On one of the days St. Patrick's were here the photos below show how the room was laid out for meditation. After the meditation each individual reflects on their experience and puts some of that reflection into creating a piece of artwork, making something or writing something down. This process is called Journaling and can help to deepen your prayer. You don't need to be on retreat to do this, you can do it at home by reading a small piece of Scripture and exploring it's meaning for you at this moment.

A group made this lovely poster when they reflected on the day they had. It contains one of our favourite words, FUN!

The group who did this this beautiful focus of a flower said that it symbolised their growth together as a class and they included a candle for each person in the class. They included some of the boxes they made in a circle too.

On the poster below there are three acrostics for PRAYER, FAITH and FORGIVING! These words formed part of our discussion through the day. We talked about how, if we are to live as Christians bringing Christ to others through our actions, then we must know the true meaning of each of these words, which isn't always easy!

Another group wrote a great acrostic with the word TRUST, one of the necessities of friendship!

Look at this beautiful focus of light! You can see the warm sun underneath the word and the ring containing all the prayers of the people in the group!

LIGHT is a recurrent theme on our retreat days, whether it's relating to Jesus as the Light of the World, ourselves and the light we bring to those around us, or others and the ways they shine their light in our lives.

One of the groups drew this poster and the path in the centre was to represent the path of life and all the words along the path are the things which accompany us on our journey! We thought it was very well thought out!

One of the groups said that their experience of the retreat was one of peace, and in the middle of the peace, God was there like a light. So, they wrote out Peace for their Focus, and put candles all around it.
Lovely work.

Here are some prayers that were written:

Lord, help us to be faithful and think about the sick in home or even in hospital. We also pray for people that cannot afford to pay for operations or sometimes medicines.
Thank you Lord for the money and hospitals that you have provided for us.

Thank you Lord,

Amen.

Dear God,

We pray for the dead, that they will never be forgotten and that the families and friends of the deceased will stay strong and live a good life. Also we thank God for everything we have and especially for all he has done for us and dying on the cross.

Thank you God, Amen.

Dear Lord,

We are thankful for the clothes on our backs and the food on our plates.
Unfortunately, not everyone is so lucky to have the privileges and luxuries that we have. They have no food, shelter or clothing.

May we continue to pray for them.

Amen.

We thank all the Year 9s for coming all the way up to Belfast for their day of retreat. They made it a lovely time for us.

St. Columbanus' College, Year 8

Year 8 marks the beginning of a new stage in life for us all. The end of your primary school career and saying farewell to old friends and teachers is swiftly followed by the nervous excitement of embarking on your post-primary career, getting to know your new school and the people in it. Times of change in our lives often provide the perfect opportunity to do a bit of reflecting, and so when the Year 8s from St Columbanus' College joined us last week, that's exactly what we did!

We spent time thinking about the process of forming new friendships. We thought about the qualities we look for in people we're considering forming friendships with. As Year 8 is a time where we meet lots of new people, we get to appreciate the variety of personalities around us and the qualities they bring to the class.

One of the Scripture readings we looked at was 1 Cor. 13 about the qualities of love and we thought of people in our own lives who are patient and kind and forgiving! Maybe some of us recognised those qualites within ourselves too!!

Jesus asked us to love one another!

Another Scripture reading we reflected on was the story of the paralysed man whose concerned friends carried him to Jesus and lowered him down through a hole they made in the roof of the house where Jesus was. That's going to great lengths to help your friend!!

One of the groups made a focus that was in the shape of the stretcher upon which four brave men carried their friend. They also drew a picture that had Jesus at the top, and under it, their class name, showing that they are disciples of Jesus.

Here are some prayers:

Dear God,
Please help my family and people who are sick.
I want to pray for people whose houses have been destroyed by earthquakes.
I would also like to pray for some people who are sad because a family member has died to make them happy again.
Amen.

Dear God,
Thank you for putting me on this earth but people can get lonely and I don't like people being lonely, 'cause sometimes I am and its not a good feeling.
So I'd like you to pair them up with someone who is lonely if you can.
Sad and rainy could be happy and shiny.
Amen.

Dear God,
I'm praying for all of the people in Africa who can't get any food or even water and can't afford anything. So please help them with love and kindness.
Amen.

Some of the songs the groups chose to play during the Liturgies this week were "Man in the Mirror" and "Hero." When we listened to Man in the Mirror, we thought about how an individual can change the world. One of the things we'd thought about was how a good quality is when you're happy to be yourself... this isn't always easy, but it's good to grow to love the Man or Woman in the Mirror!

As usual the young people we met were concerned for the difficulties that have been happening in the world and prayed for people who have experienced natural disasters around the world in the last few months.

Dear God,

Help the children in Haiti and Chile who have lost their parents.

Give them care hope and love.
Please Lord hear us.

Amen.

Dear God,

Help those in Haiti as they are less fortunate than us. Help them get money and support and a house to live in and give them love and more help.

Amen.

Dear God

Thanks for encouraging people to donate to Trócaire and to care for the people in need.

Amen.

One of the activities that our groups got up to this week was making a chain of Friendship. This is made up with strips of card. Each strip had a person's name on it, a quality that someone in their class sees in them and one that they see in themselves. It's a lovely thing to hang up in a form-class to remind everyone of the qualities that are present all around them and in themselves. Some groups used their chain as part of their focus.

Dear God,
Please help those who have nowhere to live and nothing to eat and help those who don't have clean water to drink. Help those who have lost their lives to hunger and secure a place in heaven for them.

Amen.

Dear God,

Thank you for looking after all my family and friends, and for looking after us today and keep us safe on the way home.

Amen.

A little prayer in honour of the Weather:

Dear God,Thank you for bringing rain, to feed the plants and to help them grow - thank you fo rbringing sunshine so we can play outside. All the weather you bring to us helps in so many ways.Please continue to give us it!Amen.

Our Year 8 groups were full of life, hairspikes and energy, and that's just a few of the qualities they brought to their Retreat days! We hope they enjoyed their day as much as we enjoyed meeting them and we wish them all the best, and happy days in St. Columbanus College!

St. Patrick's, Keady - Year 9

Last week we welcomed our first four groups of eight Year 9 classes who are travelling all the way from Keady in Co. Armagh to the Centre for their day of Retreat. We've had a lovely week with them. We were focussing on our attitudes to various things, including people from different faiths, ethnicities or cultures.

To help us to think about the attitudes we should try to live out, we looked at the Scriptures to see what Jesus did and said in various circumstances.

Some of the words we found in the Scriptures were; Bless, Pray, Love, Rejoice!

On our retreat days here we try to experience all of those things in one day and then we think about how we can make every day one where we Bless, Pray, Love and Rejoice!

One of the classes chose the story of Bartimaeus begging to be healed for their prayer service. He understood who Jesus was, and despite people telling him to keep quiet, he raised his own voice up. The class chose this story because of how Jesus cares for all people, and shows kindness to all.

Some groups chose the story of the Good Samaritan for their Prayer Service. Jesus told this story to people to challenge their prejudice.

Some beautiful prayers were written and prayed during the liturgies last week.

The groups prayed prayers for people who have been through difficulties in the last while:

Dear Lord,

Help all the people that have lost their homes in the Haiti and Chile earthquake disasters.

Amen.

They also prayed a prayer of thanks for us! Very kind - we're also and always grateful for every group that comes to us at the Pastoral Centre.

Dear God,

We would like to thank Caren, Brother Fintan and Margaret for having us here.

Amen.

One of the days the Focus had a real similarity with other aspects of the prayer service - we were talking about being light and love to each other - look at the pictures below to see the similarities.

We thought about ways to show Respect to one another and to ourselves. A group wrote this great acrostic reflection:

We enjoy being light and fun with each other.

This poster summed many things up - love, faith, truth, peace, respect and prayer, all in the middle of springtime images of flowers and sunshine!

There are many more prayers, photos and reflections to be added from the groups last week, and of course we have next week's groups to look forward to. This is just a flavour of what the St. Patrick's pupils brought to their days! Watch this space for the rest!!