Easter is more lasting than a chocolate egg, students learn

Sydney
20 April 2003

Seminary numbers increasing: rector

Anzac service starts busy calendar

Priest’s ministry of ‘bringing joy to migrants’

Easter at war - but hope for everyone

Many Iraqi families ‘destitute’

Pope’s play tops Carnivale Christi fare

Good Friday Holy Land appeal

Honour for doctors

New Melbourne bishop

12 years as rector at St John’s

Fr Michael’s legacy of laughter, not tears

Catholic schools still top of pops

Churches walk Way of the Cross together

Editorial: ‘Sex’ is not a dirty word

Letters: Worldwide celebration

Conversation: Bob Hartman, children’s author and storyteller - Tale spinner learnt his magic as a preacher

Voice of Youth - Cultural relevance and the Church

Iraqi War: Opinion

Easter is more lasting than a chocolate egg, students learn

‘Prophet of the new evangelisation’

‘Lap of honour’ and high 5s all round

Easter is more lasting than a chocolate egg, students learn

Hanna Bratkovic (Year 1) with her Easter Day cross

By Marilyn Rodrigues

A challenge for parents and teachers as Easter approaches is how to lead children to reflect deeply on the meaning of Holy Week, including the torment of Jesus’ Passion, without frightening or upsetting them.

When students at St Francis Xavier Primary School, Lurnea, reflected on the true meaning of Holy Week, as Catholic school students have everywhere, in a liturgy at the end of Term 1, they did not gloss over the terrible reality of Good Friday.

But Christ’s suffering was presented in the light of the hope of Easter and the generous and personal love of God.

St Francis Xavier parish priest, Fr Peter Smith, led the school in a Holy Week liturgy on the second last day of school.

He asked the children why their parents sometimes did things for them even when they didn’t feel like it, because they were tired or for some other reason.

“Because they love me”, “they care for me”, they answered.

“Well in the same way Jesus Christ died for us, for our benefit, because he loves us,” he explained.

All of the classes had a role to play in the colourful liturgy that featured prayer, singing, liturgical dance and drama.

The children recalled the seven ‘last words’, the last phrases of Jesus before he died, such as “forgive them, Father, for they know not what they do”, “today you will be with me in paradise”, “I thirst” and “Father, into your hands I commend my spirit”.

Then each grade performed a little drama of one of Jesus’ parables.

Each dramatisation was linked to one of Jesus’ last phrases and focused on a theme of forgiveness, hope, love, faith, truth, acceptance or trust.

“The seven last words of Jesus are very sombre and we wanted to get across the seriousness of them and how they relate to our lives, but at the same time leave the children with a little bit of a sense of the hope and joy of Easter that was to come,” says Miss Angela Chisari, who is religious education co-ordinator at St Francis Xavier.

She says the children were encouraged to think about their prayer, faith, and relationships with God and each other and how the life of Jesus relates to their own life journey, during Lent.

They prepared for Easter, she says, by regularly meditating on the Stations of the Cross for two weeks before the end of term, and with a ‘fast day’ when the school canteen was closed at recess and lunchtime.

That day the children were encouraged to eat a simple lunch and save the money they would have spent on treats for the Project Compassion appeal.

And they all made Easter gifts that will be more meaningful - and more lasting - than chocolate Easter eggs.

They included crosses, brooches and eggcups made out of clay, each decorated with Easter themes, as well as paintings and decorated eggs.

Mrs Jane Baron, visual arts teacher, says: “Hopefully their clay gift will a more lasting reminder for the children of the love Jesus has for each of them.”

Year 1 student Stephanie Azzopardi reflected on the images of Good Friday as she made her clay cross in class.

“I remembered how Jesus died and pictured Mary crying for her Son,” she said.

And Vanessa Siciliano (Year 5) said that making her Easter brooch “made me think about how Jesus rose from the dead”.

Mrs Helen Gardner, the school principal, says: “Reflecting on the events of Holy Week enables the children to remember the great sacrifice Jesus made for us in preparation for the feast of Easter when we proclaim our faith in Jesus and rejoice in the share he has given us in his resurrection.”