ST. ALOYSUIS HIGH
SCHOOL – BANDRA
February 27, 2012: Today, Fr. Glenford Lowe
sdb, visited St. Aloysius High School - Bandra and conducted a two hour Value
Education session for a hundred and thirty students belonging to Standard Nine.
The value based session was conducted from 2.00pm to 4.oopm in the school
auditorium. In spite of the time, the students were very cooperative and
attentive to the entire session.
The session began with an invitation to the students to reflect on their present life in the context of their past and the future ahead of them. Through a paper-reflective exercise, the students were made aware of the importance of living their lives with purpose and a value directed life. “Live your life with no excuses attached. Take responsibility for the choices that you make in life and let not your future be lost in one single moment of indecision,” Fr. Lowe repeatedly said.
A Prayer song then followed in which the students were made aware of the presence of God in everything. “God is present also in your messed up life, but if we cooperate with the Divine, then our lives become more fruitful and blessed,” he added.
Through a number of other small exercises, one-to one sharing and also through personal and group sharing, the students were then challenged to look at how their live their life and how they invest their time. Having certain Values as guiding principles in our lives, we will be able to resent our clock or reset our lives to become more meaningful.
The
session concluded with the true life story of Jackie Subarido. One could notice
that the students were fully glued to the video clip as it very fittingly,
brought together all the points spoken of in the session. At the end of the
session, the Value education teacher gave the vote of thanks and invited the
students to live the Values they were challenged to in the session. Many a
students, while leaving the hall, whispered to me, “Father, please come again
when we are in the Tenth Standard. We really enjoyed it to the full.”
Below
are a number of words of appreciation by the students themselves as written in
the AVEC Appreciation log book:
“This
session was really inspiring. I feel it will change my life and also those who
were here with me.” Shweta Bane IX-B
“It
was really good. From this session we came to know that life is very precious
and we learnt the importance and value of resetting our life and our time.” Pradnya Valanju IX-A
“We
learnt the important value of leaving our past behind us and to take control of
the future ahead of us in order to make our life more meaningful and worthy of
life.” Olivia Lobo IX-B
“This
Value session helped me to learn how important we are in our life and how we
can make our life more meaningful.” Roveena
Dhonde IX- B
“I have learnt some of the Values given by F. Glenford Lowe. He is a very good person. He gave us some values that will change our life. I liked the video clip on Jackie Subarido and I am proud of her.” Harshal Solakni IX-B
“I have learnt some of the good values given by Fr. Glenford Lowe. I thank you for you have given me something that can change my life and make it better. This session has helped me to focus on my future with purpose and direction like the lady Jackie, who, in spite of all her difficulties and tragedies of life is making her life worthwhile to live for. I too am so proud of her.” Hilesh Bamaniyu IX-B