Thankfulness, resilience, the Psalms and an invitation to those who pray.
Alarm and doom fills our news feeds, vies for attention in our social algorithm. My feed, at least, also proliferates with posts about raising young people with "grit" "resilience" or whatever the latest buzz word of the week is.
Google's dictionary offers up "the capacity to withstand or to recover quickly from difficulties; toughness" as a definition for resilience.
The Psalms offers us a glimpse into this over and over again. Many of them composed in or after times of great trouble. We hear the Psalmists' cry out in their trouble, recount times of distress and perhaps most significantly again and again extolling thankfulness to God.
I will give thanks to you, Lord, with all my heart;
I will tell of all your wonderful deeds. Psalm 9:1
In Christian Studies classes this year we have been making a practice of this at the start of each lesson. Students spend 5 minutes quietly noting down two highlights from their last week, one lowlight from the last week and one think they are thankful for that day. Following the structure of many of the Psalms we remind ourselves of what is good alongside acknowledging that which is difficult. Recognising what is causing us stress, but balancing it with that which is positive and a blessing in our lives.
As a school we have much to be thankful for this term, can I encourage you to spend some time with your young men reflecting on this!
An invitation to those who pray: there are a group of parents who try to meet periodically to pray for our boys and wider school community. We are meeting this coming Monday 16th March, 7pm upstairs in the Edgar Learning Centre (ELC) - Parents & Friends Room. We would love anyone who wishes to join us.
God Bless, Mike Brown
Chaplain
Open Event Registration - Interested in enrolling?
Employment opportunities - click if you're interested in working at McGlashan.