GIFT Team - Growing In Faith Together

“It is up to you, young followers of Christ, to show the world that faith brings happiness and a joy which is true, full and enduring.” Pope Benedict XVI

St Edmund's GIFT Team are a group of year 5 and 6 pupils who have been appointed by our school and parish Priest - Fr John - to provide a joyful witness to Christ in our school.

We are missionary disciples sent to spread the Word of God throughout the school and the school community.

The aims of St Edmund’s GIFT Team are:

To help the school to grow as a community of faith
To encourage the pupils to live their faith in daily living
To support Liturgy, prayer and spiritual life of the school
To involve pupils in fundraising for charities
To continue to develop strong links with the Parish
To support the school in its Mission Statement

During Advent, The GIFT Team planned and led Advent Prayer Stations which gave the whole school a time to deepen their own faith through a time of prayer.

The GIFT Team led our Holy Week Reflection for the whole school - we washed the feet of some of the Key Stage One pupils.

The GIFT Team led the pupils, parents, parishioners, governors and our very special guest, Bishop John Arnold, round the interactive Sensory Stations of the Cross.

The GIFT Team lead the whole school Ash Wednesday services leading the school into their Lenten journey!

During Advent, the GIFT Team visited two local care homes to deliver a short interactive service featuring some of our Advent prayer stations. These visits were incredibly well received by the residents and staff and it was an excellent way for pupils to bear witness to their faith in our wider community.

The focus of the GIFT Team's prayer group this half term has been Harvest. The GIFT Team planned prayer stations around the parable of the Sower. Each week groups of children from year 3 spent time in reflective prayer. Albie from Team Teal said it was 'Wonderful!'

For Harvest this year, we held a food collection which was donated to CommUNITY Little Hulton's Harvest Hamper campaign. We were overwhelmed by the sheer volume of generous donations which were sent in by our families, and the GIFT Team were proud to collect these up and send them off with Emma from the CommUNITY Little Hulton Team.

The GIFT Team worked collaboratively with the GIFT Team from Christ The King to develop Big Questions that are used at the beginning and end of each Come and See theme.

The GIFT Team lead lunch time prayer groups.

The GIFT Team plan and deliver whole school Collective Worship to celebrate the Liturgical Year.

The GIFT Team visited the Ladauto Si Centre to experience what the centre has to offer and to learn more about how they can live more sustainably to take care of our common home. The children have made an action plan to put into place this year to develop what we already do at school to support Ladauto Si.
During the visit which took place just before Advent, the children planned alongside the children from CTK Advent prayer stations that they would then deliver to children back at school.

We met with the GIFT Team from Christ The King to discuss the Big Listen Questions from the Synod. We then presented our responses to the Parish at Sunday Mass. You can read our responses here.

On a Monday morning, the GIFT Team meet to plan the following weeks whole school Liturgical Prayer.

Members of the GIFT Team had a very special trip to Salford Cathedral to visit the Relics of St Bernadette. After their visit, the team delivered an assembly to KS2 to tell them all about their experience.