To Be Known
Reflections on the All-School Fall Retreat
Monday marks LGA’s school-wide Fall Retreat. The students will begin by celebrating Mass with the community, after which they’ll spend some quiet time immersed in the natural beauty of Pyramid Mountain. To close the day, one of our families will generously open their home to the students for an afternoon of fellowship and fun. We asked their hostess, Katie Martinson, why it’s so important to her to provide the time and space for this retreat. Her reflections are worthy of the special day itself:
The BBC television comedy series Twenty Twelve skewers bureaucratic preparation for the London Summer Olympics. In one episode, the organizing committee is tasked with choosing from among 3 candidates to lead “Cultural Olympiad.” The problem is that no one seems to have the ability or the fortitude to define what culture is. At one point, the job is even offered to a candidate who proposes for the cultural venue an empty tent, filled at random.
Sometimes education can seem like an empty tent. Curricular fads come and go; last year’s methods are anathema this year; what was deemed essential yesterday is considered repugnant today. LGA offers the antidote for this cycle: a culture of timelessness. That culture can be found in our classical curriculum, our bonds of fellowship, and our shared pursuit of truth.
But how is this culture best fostered?
At LGA our model is Our Lord, who knows us and calls us by name. From Nathanael (“I saw you under the fig tree”), to Zacchaeus (“today I must stay at your house”), to the woman at the well (“Come see a man who told me everything I have done”), to each one of us, Our Savior knows and loves everyone He encounters. He shows us that to learn, one must be loved -- and to be loved, one must be known.
It is fitting that our school year should begin with the forming of school culture. The LGA all-school retreat will help us get to know one another through a day set apart for prayer, nature, conversation, and games. So we can begin to be known, and to be loved…and to learn.