Showing posts with label school assembly. Show all posts
Showing posts with label school assembly. Show all posts

Wednesday, 20 March 2013

Try to be me and try not to laugh

I was involved in the local high school's assembly today. When I say involved - I closed in prayer and wished the pupils a good Easter and holiday.

The whole assembly was shared by the chaplaincy team. Though there were a few there, it was slickly organised, with one person at a time doing a piece.

The thing I 'struggled' with was the concentration of Jesus' death on the cross being all about sacrifice, yet with overtones of God being a loving father. I wonder how the children were thinking through how a loving father would require the sacrifice of his son? As you may have gathered, I don't think that should be the focus of the Christian message, but that's a discussion for another time.

So, having been asked 5 minutes before the assembly began to pray and sat through an assembly all about sacrifice I was aware I had to choose my words carefully in my prayer. I also was mindful we'd run over and could see people waiting to gain access to the hall. None of these factors were my fault, but I didn't want to make things worse. So, I was short and to the point. I think I found a tone which neither undermined the assembly as a whole nor my own theology. I never thought that would be a skill I'd develop, but there's times when it's useful.

The main thing I learnt today was how to not corpse when this was played. On so many levels this was funny (even though it shouldn't ave been)...