Prayer and Liturgy at St Alban's
Mission Statement
“At St Alban’s School we pray together, work together and play together”
This is what our children said when we asked…
“What is special about our school?”
Here at St Alban’s we are inspired to follow in the footsteps of Jesus and to be the best that we can be by being kind and respecting everyone and everything. We do our best in school and at home, working hard and caring for each other and for the whole world. We know that we are all special in different ways and we always try to include everybody in our friendship.
Introduction
We believe that Christian worship in a Catholic school names and celebrates God’s presence in our lives. It is concerned with giving glory, honour, praise and thanks to God. It is our loving response, in word and action, to God’s invitation to enter into relationship, made possible through the work of Jesus Christ and the witness of the Holy Spirit.
The To Know You More Clearly programme provides opportunities for celebration, prayer and reflection in implicit and explicit ways.
Religious education is a collaborative activity that respects and promotes the capacity for wonder, awe, reverence and imagination.
“Celebrations of various kinds which help children to understand some of the elements of liturgy (greeting, silence, community praise, especially in song) have a great part to play in the liturgical life of the church.”
(Directory of Children’s Masses)
It is a legal requirement that prayer and liturgy is provided daily for all registered pupils. It is, however, more than this. It is an integral part of school life and central to Catholic tradition and in school is monitored by the SLT and the RE lead.
Prayer and Liturgy can take various forms. It can be an assembly celebration at the end of a topic or a simple celebration in the classroom situation, but it should be concerned with reverence or veneration to God. In a Catholic school, prayer is addressed to the Father, through the Son, in the power of the Spirit.
In prayer and liturgy we must consider the audience we are addressing. Simple searching questions, that relate to children’s everyday experience and age should be asked. Subject matter should relate to pupils’ understanding of life, religion and worship, as well as including relevant current affairs as a time to reflect and pray.
Aims
We believe that Prayer and Liturgy in our school aims to provide opportunity for all pupils and staff:
- To contemplate something of the mystery of God
- To reflect on spiritual and moral issues
- To explore their own beliefs
- To be respectful and reverent towards the beliefs of others
- To respond to and celebrate life
- To experience a sense of belonging and develop community spirit
- To develop a common ethos and shared values
- To enrich religious experience
- To introduce children to aspects of the Gospel message and to reflect and celebrate the Word of God at their own level
- To grow in liturgical understanding and development
- To reinforce prayers which are part of the Catholic tradition
- To reinforce positive attitudes
- To participate fully
- To take time out ‘to wonder at’, ‘to come to terms with’ and ‘to give worth to.’
Principles
Acts of Worship in this school will:
- Give glory and honour to God;
- Be a quality activity, fundamental to the life of the school and its Catholic character;
- Develop in pupils skills that enable them to prepare, organise and lead worship rather than always participating or contributing in a token way;
- Give pupils positive liturgical experiences, appropriate to their age, aptitude and family backgrounds in order to prepare them for the liturgical life of the Church.
In order to do this, celebrations will:
- be kept small wherever possible or appropriate to help to personalise the experience;
- be short and appropriately paced (A child’s attention span is said to last in any one activity for an average of one minute per year of life e., 5-6 minutes for Key Stage 1 and 7-10 minutes for Key Stage 2 );
- be simple, including a range of experiences offered in a variety of groupings and in a variety of settings.
Prayer and Liturgy in our school will be:
- properly planned
- adequately resourced
- recorded
- monitored
- evaluated
Setting
The setting should be conducive for prayer, reflection and celebration. Sometimes worship will be quiet and contemplative and at other times it will involve music, laughter and dance. The mixture needs to be creative and varied, joyful and reverent, penitent and spirit filled.
Assemblies
Prayer and liturgy is carried out as part of an assembly or within individual classrooms. Our assemblies are a coming together of the school community. They provide an opportunity to extend, enhance and support the programme used in the classroom.
Our assemblies can be a time of greeting, reflection, praise, thanksgiving, meditation and celebration, and take place each week along with a celebration of the week or on a specific subject, for example, within the To Know You More Clearly programme.
Key Stage Assemblies take place on Wednesday and Thursday. Whole school assemblies take place on Monday and Friday, At the end of each half term, there is an end of branch celebration assembly to which parents are invited. Prayers are led by each class in turn every Friday afternoon.
Structure
All forms of prayer and liturgy follow the accepted four-fold structure of gather, listen, response and send and particular emphasis may be placed on specific parts as appropriate.
All Prayer and Liturgy must contain some form of scripture, whether it be a full passage or just a short sentence for reflection and meditation and a responsive prayer element, such as a litany or bidding prayers.
Liturgies in School
“All those concerned with education should work and plan together to ensure that the children have some idea of God and the supernatural, in proportion to their years and degree of maturity. They can have experience of human values which are involved in the Eucharist celebration by acting together as a community; exchanging greetings; the capacity to listen; to forgive and ask forgivenss; to express gratitude; experience symbolic actions; conviviality and festive celebrations.”
(Directory of Children’s Masses)
Eucharistic celebrations in school will highlight a special occasion and will normally be celebrated with children whose faith development has reached an appropriate stage. The same general principles will apply to planning a Eucharistic celebration as other acts of school worship, therefore opportunities for children to participate will be maximised. When preparing these celebrations reference will be made to the Directory for Masses with Children as a basis for our practice.
The Sacraments of Reconciliation and Eucharist are celebrated in Year 4 of Key Stage 2 and the children are prepared for their reception by the parish catechists and their class teachers (when applicable).
Although children in Years 3 and below are not able to take part in the Sacrament of the Eucharist, all children attend school Mass at various points throughout the year. These are sometimes held in Church and sometimes in school.
Celebrations other than Eucharistic
Key Stage One children are gradually introduced into the mysteries of faith which the Community celebrates in Eucharistic liturgy. They can be introduced to the Gospel message with a time to reflect and celebrate the message at their own level and pace. Children can be introduced to symbols and movements of the liturgy. Celebration enables children to experience being part of a community of faith. As children are aware of a sense of ritual, parts of the Mass can be incorporated in the following ways:
- a) Introductory Rites – simple welcome to celebration
- b) Penitential rite / Gloria / Opening prayer – Although all three aspects can be incorporated, it is better to choose one and preference might be given to one liturgical season, e.g. Gloria during Easter season.
- c) A scripture passage should always be included in celebration.
- d) Using various methods i.e. pictures, simple responses, children can be encouraged to internalise God’s message to his people.
- e) Art and music offer wonderful opportunities for children to enjoy and respond to celebrations.
