Blessing of the backpacks
Welcome back everyone! Happy Lunar New Year to those celebrating.
A very warm welcome to new families who have joined us at Radford this year. We look forward to getting to know you. The chaplaincy team at Radford College consists of me, Rev. Katherine Rainger, and Chaplain Andy Fleming. In next week’s bulletin we’ll take some more time to introduce ourselves.
This is not the start of year that we had all had hoped for. Many in the Canberra community and beyond continue to face the challenges of COVID-19. My hope is that we’ll continue to support each other through this time, and that those who are working hard to be there for others also get the support that they need.
Within our human experience of living with weariness, change and chance, God is with us.
God’s hope and grace can emerge from unexpected places. Jesus used ordinary objects to point to God’s grace. Water becomes a sign of new life and refreshment. Bread and wine become signs of the presence of God with us in the person of Jesus. Light is a sign of God’s hope and guidance. A lost coin and lost sheep, a sign of God’s perseverance in reaching out to us.
Where might we find the extraordinary in the ordinary in our daily lives? As we’ve started chapel services this week we have ‘blessed the backpacks’, and all the hope and anticipation that backpacks contain, especially at the beginning of a new school year.
In Junior School chapels, staff and students have prayed the following (based on the words of Rev. Jeremy Fletcher):
Creator God, we give you thanks for the new start which February brings.
We thank you for schools, colleges and universities, and all who learn, teach and serve in them.
We thank you for the opportunity to learn and grow at every stage; for the gift of making mistakes and trying again.
We bring before you these bags, which through the year to come will carry the tools of learning and playing.
We bring to you those days when these bags feel heavy and difficult, and those days when they feel light and easy.
Bless these bags, all that they will contain, and the children who carry them.
Help each of us to grow in our knowledge and love of you, that we may see you more clearly, love you more dearly, follow you more nearly. Amen.
Amid the challenges that we’ll no doubt face this year, may opportunities for growth and learning abound for each one of us.
Rev. Katherine