Here at Raphael House, the Festivals look to two different cycles to mark the passing of the year.

To experience the cycle of the seasons we mark the ‘four corners’ of the year with our seasonal festivals: Michaelmas (Autumn), Matariki (Winter), Raphael (Spring) and Angels in the Garden (Summer). To experience the cycle of life itself we are informed by the three Christian Festivals: Christmas (the mystery of birth and our feeling life), Easter (the mystery of death and our thinking life) and Pentecost (the mystery of rebirth and our doing life). Having celebrated Autumn’s gift of the harvest with our Michaelmas celebration earlier in the term, and as we really begin to experience the ‘dying’ of the year, today we acknowledged our Easter Festival.

Here at Raphael House, we centre our Easter Festival around the theme of transformation. For adults we might reflect on our own mortality, recognising those who have passed and knowing that in each sad ending new life will spring. For our older students we observe and assist in these transformations: wool and sticks into God’s Eyes; tissue paper and card into a window picture; a collection of single voices into a choir; acts of kindness into a healthy class and community. For our younger children we take our cues from the changing natural world around us: bulbs planted in autumn transform into flowers in the spring; a caterpillar transforms into a butterfly and a leveret into a hare; the moon moving through its phases.

While our recognition of the cycle of life does draw heavily on the Christian Festivals, we as teachers recognise the wealth of different cultures and religions which build our community here at Raphael House. This year, Easter coincides with both Passover and Ramadan, giving teachers a wonderful opportunity to acknowledge some of the different religious beliefs of the students at here at Raphael House.

Please enjoy these photographs of some of our Easter Festival preparation and we hope you have a wonderful holiday.