Looking Back to the Beginning of the Last Year

Spiritual Formation and Celebrations

It is our desire to be and to become a community of learners, full participants in all of life. At RMCS we recognize that it is Jesus’ presence, hidden and unseen that brings life, richness and rest.

Our last year was shaped by John Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress, the life of St. Francis, Joan of Arc and Brother Bryan. This coming year we hope to add to our fellowship of saints’ with the lives of St. Martin of Tours, Amy Carmichael, and Fred Shuttlesworth among others.

Our year will be steeped in Psalms. This is our primary source for recitation and meditation. We will begin this year with Psalm 8. The practice of reading and responding to the rest of Scripture will be attended to by Bible reading in the classrooms at least twice a week with narrations following.

Attention to the Church Year is woven in to our day to day life at RMCS. It’s seasonal rhythms and rituals will undergird our ordinary school days and in time will be traditions of our little work. We want our students to be ever mindful that God is thinking of them and thinks well of them. It is our hope that each of us will find Jesus to be our Shepherd and our Host (Psalm 23). The school sees itself in these roles as well – protecting the sheep/children from harm, leading them to nourishing pastures of learning and refreshing streams of hope, and then offering them a vast and deep ‘feast’ of curricular ideas and skills.

We will gather together in excursions, chapels and other times to participate in these historic celebrations. In the fall we celebrate the Jewish feasts of Rosh Hashanah and Sukkoth. In November we will have a Thanksgiving Feast. Advent Chapels take on a distinctive feel as we await our Epiphany Service of Worship in January. We will also offer an outdoor Nativity similar to St. Francis’ first crèche in Italy years ago. We observe Lent by attending an Ash Wednesday service and then wear burlap for 6 weeks of chapel while we wait together for the royal velvet robes of Easter. This year we will participate in a Stations of the Cross in preparation for Good Friday and Holy Week. Our year ends with our St. George and the Dragon Faire in April and finally a ‘Coronation Chapel’ in May. Each child is blessed and prayed over at this tender service while we reflect on our year together and offer prayers of gratitude for God’s presence among us.

Singing together is a treasured part of our day. We have a wide selection of hymns that we add to each year. Last year’s signature songs included ‘The Church’s One Foundation,’ ‘How Sweet the Name of Jesus Sounds,’ “Oh the Deep Deep Love of Jesus,’ Let Us Love and Sing and Wonder,’ ‘Beneath the Cross of Jesus,’ ‘O Love That Will Not Let Me Go,’ ‘Stricken, Smitten and Afflicted,’ and many others. We sense a deep mystery when we sing and have found that it has a strengthening, restorative effect on each of us.

”Jesus, we surrender our hands, our heads and our hearts, knowing that your nearness is our only good.”