From the Chaplain

Greeting to KWS families

I love tradition – well the best of traditions. I enjoy enacting things that people across many generations have performed. I like how the faithfulness of people who have gone before me gives meaning and encouragement to my own life. Traditions anchor us in fast changing times where deeper value and meaning is often overlooked.

Deuteronomy 11:8 instructs the Hebrew people to put their words of faith in their hearts and minds, and on their door posts and gates of their houses; it tells them to teach their children to love God and to serve God with all their hearts and souls from the time they rise to the time they lie down.

Some orthodox Jewish men today will wear phylacteries on their forehead and forearms with words from their scripture during prayer times. It reminds them to be faithful to God.

Reminders to faithfulness are helpful especially when I am triggered and upset. Reminders to be humble and to make way for God to work in the world through myself and others keeps life in perspective. Reminders of the generations of faithful men and women who have gone before connects me across time and to one another. 

There is much hope in tradition.

Rev Dr Rosalie Clarke