Mr. Hammond’s Chapel Reflection Wednesday, 25 August 2010 – Laying Tracks
Thursday, August 26th, 2010Laying Tracks
Chapel Reflection
Wednesday, 25 August 2010
Hello teachers and parents:
On most chapel days I will post a blog and a podcast on the school website. The blog will give the basic text of the chapel reflection and the podcast will provide you the actual reflection. In order to teach our students powerful, common messages together, I would ask your help to reinforce the chapel reflections in your classroom and in your homes. Everyone will do this a little different, depending on what speaks to you and what your child seems to need at the moment. But when we can come together for the good of the children and “speak with one voice” to them, it creates a powerful voice that will be meaningful in their lives. The chapel reflections are always organized around the Gospel reading for the next Sunday.
Some people have not had the opportunity to work with children around scripture. That is perfectly okay. Today is a great time to start. Pedagogically, (big word which means teaching and learning), remember that the question is your most powerful tool as a teacher. When you question, it places upon the student the opportunity to think critically and deeply (age-appropriate, of course) and this is at the core of what we do in the learning process at Saint Patrick Catholic School.
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Good morning to everyone young and old and welcome to the first chapel of the year. You know, this time of year is all about “laying tracks” for us to ride on for the rest of the year. When you think about it, every big freight train runs on steel tracks. And as powerful as the train is without the tracks, it simply cannot run. It cannot go anywhere. Isn’t that funny (isn’t that ironic)… something as big and powerful as a train can only sit there and do nothing without tracks to run on.
The tracks that we “run on” as a school are the procedures that we come to understand and practice. Do you know what a procedure is? A procedure is something we do in order that we can be safer or faster or smoother. Procedures are extremely important for all great teams whether they are schools or athletic teams or business teams or military teams. Procedures help us “make it happen” and “get it done.” Can you think of some procedures that you have been learning and will be practicing during the first month of school? Can you think of procedures that you use in your athletic teams?
We also have procedures in chapel so this is a good time to talk about what chapel is designed for and what we do inside a chapel. Let’s go over some of the important things about a chapel. Here are 12 important things about chapel that will help you understand better and participate more.
1.) First, the whole school community is welcome at chapel. Yep, that’s right. All students, all teachers and staff, all parents and all friends. The only group that we do not have in chapel is the four-year-old students and that’s because they’re just a little bit too young to sit for 45 minutes or so. But kindergartners do a great job and we’re already proud of you kindergartners!
2.) We have chapel every other week. In the intervening weeks we have something much more important than chapel and that is Mass or Eucharist. This is very special and we will talk about that soon as well. But right now we are focusing on chapel.
3.) Our chapel is a school-wide prayer where we all come together to be happy and give thanks to God, to ask God’s forgiveness, and to study Jesus’ words (of Love and Truth) so that we may live a holier, intelligent and happier life, to learn about the Catholic faith and to pray for others who need our prayers.
You see, prayer is just the name we give to communicating with God. Some people think prayers are only words, but we know here prayers can be many other things that show God that we are listening to and living “the way, the truth and the life” (Jesus is “the Way, the Truth and the Life”).
4.) Greetings from a student leader to begin the opening (Processional) Song:
I would like to introduce you to our liturgical choir leader and cantor, Mrs. Rickie Jean Lynch. Mrs. Lynch teaches in the middle school and has led youth choirs for many years. And to the choir! You can be in the choir starting in the 4th grade if you like and the choir practices on Mondays . I would also like to introduce you to Mr. Chris Kypros. If you do not know Mr. Kypros, you will soon. He teaches all students the joy of music and choral performance. He is a fun person!
5.) Student led opening prayer, our school prayer and The Pledge Of Allegiance. In this part of chapel, we recognized that students are the purpose for why we are here and whenever we get the chance to give students leadership roles and activities, we do so. It is one way to “Identify, Nurture and Celebrate” the gifts of each and every student. You will become very familiar with our school prayer and other prayers that we will memorize.
6.) Welcome, opening blessing and request for forgiveness: Any time a group comes together, the leader of that group welcomes everyone, makes any special announcements and since chapel is about prayer, the leader will offer a blessing to get things started. Afterwards, we ask forgiveness in the prayer “Lord have mercy, Christ have mercy, Lord have mercy.” This is simply a prayer where we take the opportunity to ask and receive forgiveness for our sins in preparation for our chapel celebration.
7.) The First Reading of the Gospel: The Gospel is the stories that four people wrote down about Jesus’ birth, life, death and resurrection. The four writers are called evangelist and they are: St. Matthew, St. Mark, St. Luke and St. John. Much of the Gospels have to do with stories Jesus told called parables or other things he said to people. The Gospel reading that we use will always be the one which will be read the next Sunday. So, the one we read here today will be proclaimed at Mass and many other church services this coming Sunday. We do this so that you can be greatly prepared for the reading in your church on Sunday.
I know that many of you have the opportunity to go to church on Sunday. I also know that many of you don’t have that opportunity, yet. I want you to know that that’s okay. God loves you right where you are and when you get the opportunity to go to Mass or church on Sunday you will and that’s fine.
8.) Reflection on the Gospel: after the first reading of the Gospel, the leader will offer some insights into the Gospel and we usually have a great discussion about it as a community. Mr. David Main will post our reflection as a podcast on our website where parents, teachers and other friends and you can listen to it. You, parents and teachers are encouraged to listen to it and continue the discussion throughout the week. Also, I will usually post chapel notes as a blog on our website for you, parents and teachers to use. This is one way that our entire community is teaching and learning the same things together. When we all learn together, there is a special bonding and( force alive in our community.
9.) The Second Reading of the Gospel: After reflecting upon the Gospel for the first time, you will always hear something a little different than the second time you hear it. That is because Scripture always keeps giving us insight. The Word of God always keeps giving. If it didn’t, it wouldn’t be God’s Word.
10.) The Prayer of the Faithful and Sung Response: This is a special time where we pray for others in our community. We pray for those we love, for the church, for our national leadership, for peace and justice in the world. We do this together and our response is oftentimes sung. Mrs. Anderson will usually lead us in the Prayer of the Faithful. We call it the Prayer of the Faithful, because as a people faithful to Jesus, we understand and know the power of prayer and give our requests (petition) to God knowing that God will answer our prayer in the best way for us.
11.) Announcements: oftentimes, we will take this time to celebrate special moments or make announcements for the good of the school.
12.) Closing (Recessional) Song: We wrap it up with a song to get on with our day and proceed in an organized and respectful way out of our prayer space.
Well, that is what chapel is all about. A joyous time to come together and pray, learn, and remind ourselves that central to what we are about in this Catholic school is understanding and living the Gospel of Jesus. This is something that we as a community teach our children with one voice.
Please know that it must be spoken to be believed. So many times we think children will just absorb beliefs … without us actually speaking them. This is patently false. There is power in the spoken word and the spoken word brings things and beliefs into reality.
I encourage you, teachers and parents, to join with me to teach our students and children to live these Gospel lessons. We are a team! Together we will make a difference! Neither you nor I will be perfect in teaching them nor will anyone else. The children will not be perfect in learning them. So, let us just allow God’s grace to flow through us and we will teach our children happily and with confidence. Or as we often say to the children: Do your best; let God do the rest! Good luck!
Here are some questions that you might use with your children, but, better yet, make up your own. Of course these questions that need to be asked on age appropriate levels for children, but you get the idea. Play around with the questions and attempt to keep them open ended questions. Remember open-ended questions promote discussion and critical thinking!
1.) What is Chapel all about? What do you do in Chapel?
2.) Why do you listen to the Gospel twice?
3.) What was the Gospel about?
4.) Why does Chapel study the Gospel that will be proclaimed in the following Sunday?
5.) What are the Gospels? Who wrote the Gospels?
6.) What are the stories that Jesus told called?
7.) What did you learn from the Gospel today (or on Wednesday)?
8.) What attracted you in the Gospel today? What did not attract you in the Gospel reading?
9.) What do you think Jesus was feeling in the Gospel? What was the evangelist feeling when he witnessed Jesus and the Gospel?
10.) What was the major theme of this Gospel reading?
