Today, we have been listening carefully. We have listened to St. Luke's Gospel reading (Luke 9:28-36), which tells us about the 'TRANSFIGURATION'. Peter, James and John go up high on a mountain with Jesus, where they see him transfigured- he looks different, surrounded by light, accompanied by two Old Testament prophets, Moses and Elijah. Peter, James and John would know that God was saying something about new about Jesus. God was showing something of what Jesus really was; he was not just an ordinary person they had known for years. He had a different relationship with God and with people who had spoken importantly about God in the past.

We understand now that Jesus was sent by God; that Jesus was God, as well as being a man. Jesus came for a unique purpose: to show us God's love, and to die for us; but if we really look and listen to other people, we begin to realise that God is present in them, too. We can get to know God by loving others.

Today, we talked about how important it is to listen to our family, friends and teachers.

We played games which required excellent listening skills.
We played:

Reading rhymes to our friends, asking them to guess our final rhyming pattern;

Building towers or models from bricks, taking turns to give a friend instructions to build a model without showing them our own. When completed, looking to see if thy were the same;

God appears to Moses, who is a shepherd looking after his sheep in the desert, as a burning bush. The bush burns continuously, but the flames do not burn it up. God tells Moses to take off his shoes, because he is walking on holy ground. He tells Moses he has come to rescue the people of Israel from slavery in Egypt.
Moses is worried about trying to tell this to the Israelites and asks what name he should use for this God who has come for them.God says, "I AM WHO I AM"- that will be his name forever.

Father John asked us to think about the quality of love. It is never used up, no matter how fiercely we feel it; it is never worn out; it never ends. It is like the burning bush, which burns brightly, but does not burn away. "I AM WHO I AM" means the same thing..."I AM.....LOVE".

Father John asked us to think about the loving people we knew...they burn like bright flames in our lives, and their flames do not go out...they are a light for us which goes on and on.

So God loves us on and on. He finds us in the desert places of our lives and forgives us.

Here are the pictures for the other readings today:

Luke 13: 1-9 and 1Corinthians 10: 1-6; 10-12.

We remembered our mothers and all those who take care of us. We made cards for them, to say thank you.

In the Gospel reading today Jesus is asked to make a judgement upon a woman who has sinned. His reply turned the judgement back onto those who asked the question, saying
" If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her."

At this, those who heard began to go away one at a time, the older ones first, until only Jesus was left, with the woman still standing there.

Jesus straightened up and asked her, "Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?"

First of all today, we remember the way Jesus entered into Jerusalem. Crowds of people welcomed him, shouting, "Hosanna!". They rushed to collect greenery - palm trees would be growing nearby, so they would collect those leaves - to wave. As processed into church with Father John, we carried flowers and leaves from our gardens.We stood around the altar for the first reading, which described the warm welcome given to Jesus. People were glad to see him, but soon changed their minds, wanting to get rid of him. Soon, Jesus would be condemned to death upon a cross. That is why, each year, we take home from church crosses made out of palms- and today is called Palm Sunday. It is also called Passion Sunday, because people in church hear the whole story of Jesus' "Passion"- his suffering and dying.

Father John blessed the palms and we went for our liturgy.