Renfrewshire, East Renfrewshire, Inverclyde & Argyll

Another school term has just about finished – and it’s been a busy one.

There are so many opportunities in Scottish schools just now in a wide variety of contexts. Give thanks to God for the many opportunities there are to help children and young people explore the Bible. Many of the young people I speak to have never really talked about what the Bible might be about, who Jesus is, or what he might have to do with them.

SU Scotland's vision is to see the children and young people of Scotland exploring the Bible and responding to the significance of Jesus. This is not some airy fairy ideal – I see the reality of this from week to week in many different schools, and the opportunity to have meaningful conversations with pupils continues to grow.

Of course, it’s not just me… SU Scotland relies on volunteers and it’s been great to get around SU groups across the country to see how things are getting on. I’m grateful to all those who, week after week, commit to opening up the Bible with children and young people. Could you support an SU group in your local school?

It’s been good to see more people from churches playing a part in their local schools too. The Religious Observance (RO) part of the curriculum is something which chaplains are getting more and more involved in. I recently had the opportunity to share with school management teams and chaplains some of the work we have developed in one local secondary school over the last year or two. These were two seminars which allowed me to speak to quite a few people at once… usually I am going all over west of Scotland to meet with one or two at a time so this was a real bonus!

We had a great Megamix weekend in February, and the monthly primary event on a Saturday afternoon continues to be a great opportunity to get the children from about eight schools across East Renfrewshire together. I’d love to see this work grow in order to run something similar across the Renfrewshire area. That’s my goal at least!

It’s good to see churches getting involved in running Easter Code events – this is a great event for P6 & P7 pupils to visit local churches and explore the Easter story. Schools are delighted to have the support of local churches in this part of the curriculum. If you think your church could run an event or would like more info on this please get in touch with me – i’d love to meet and discuss the possibilities. If you are wondering what other churches are doing why not look at our Serve Your Local School (SYLS) website?

SU Scotland is committed to seeing young people being discipled, trained and serving in their schools, churches and at residential events. We run Basecamp training events for S5 & S6 pupils and LeadUp for older teens. Go to the COmMISSION page to discover a programme that would be a real benefit to young people in your church.