PrayDay for Schools

[Dave Roberts]

This year’s European PrayDay for schools is in less than two months on Tuesday 18 November. Will you be taking part?

If you haven’t heard about it before, this is a day set aside every year as a day for people across Europe to focus on praying for their schools. Events take place all over Europe, from Iceland to Romania. You’ll find more information at www.prayday.eu. The day is for:

· all types of school from nursery to sixth form,

· pupils, school staff, governors, parents, church leaders, youth workers and anyone else concerned about young people,

· any Christian who believes that God hears our prayers.

You could get involved by:

* just praying on your own,
* getting together with a few others to pray,
* organising a prayer meeting in your school for pupils and/or staff,
* organising a prayer evening for everyone from your church,
* setting up a stall in or outside a school and offering to pray for pupils and staff,
* leading a school assembly about what prayer means to Christians,
* teaching an RE lesson on how and why Christians pray

But there’s no need to be limited by these suggestions. The website at www.prayday.eu (please note this is a new address since last year) has more ideas. The site includes a downloadable info pack with lots of suggestions for different kinds of prayer events and different ways to pray at those events; prayer needn’t just involve sitting quietly with heads bowed!

Do start planning now – there won’t be much time after half term! And whatever else you do or don’t do, please do pray for our schools and all those involved with them. What goes on in school affects millions of young people directly and has a huge effect on our nation, so let’s make sure we hold our schools before God.

Please pass this email on to anyone you know who works in schools, leads a school Christian group or might be interested in setting up a prayer event on 18 November. (And if you receive this several times as a result, sorry!) Or you could invite yourself and your friends to the day on Facebook at www.new.facebook.com/event.php?eid=53549500328. We'd love to get as many people as possible involved; there's no copyright on prayer!