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.