Welcome to Animate

Animate... Working with Schools

Lowe House is the home for Youth Ministry in the Diocese. With a large hall, smaller rooms, Youth Café and extensive grounds we can help to develop RE curriculum in schools. Days of Recollection, Retreat Days, Days with a Difference can help support your needs in delivering dynamic, contemporary and inspiring sessions to communicate the Gospel message. We endeavour to enhance ICONS Programme for RE by running days that will work in conjunction with the curriculum. We work on many different themes with different year group from schools across the Diocese, working with the school beforehand to prepare a day around the needs of the young people coming. We are a Team with flexibility and if it is not possible to come away we will come to you.

School Missions
Over the past couple of years the Team has been working with a number of schools, including St Mary’s-Crosby, SS Peter and Paul’s-Widnes, St Bede’s-Ormskirk and St Aelred’s- Newton le Willows on full scale school missions. This involves 8-9 months pre-mission planning, a celebration week and post- mission follow up. As the Team is local we can be on hand to help advise and support the mission of the school. To find out more details please do not hesitate to contact us.

Here are a selection of school groups that the Animate Team have been working with...

After welcoming year 7 and year 8 to Lowe House this year, it was our turn to go to St Peter’s. It had to be one of the best weeks of the year. As St Peter was given the keys to the kingdom, the school decided to focus on the theme ‘Keys to our Faith’. We had loads of involvement from pupils from all the years to help us to bring the theme to life in the drama theatre with games, songs, clips, prayer and input and testimony from the team on different aspects of the theme. The week culminated with Mass in the Sports hall with the different year groups and they were great celebrations for all. We even managed to return to St Peter’s on the Tuesday after mission to bring together a taster of the week in a celebration with friends, family, parishioners and the community.

At time of writing, we are in the middle of a week with the year 8 boys from Cardinal Heenan. We have about 50 of the lads coming each day and exploring the theme ‘Love Your Neighbour as Yourself’. It’s a great opportunity to think about how we treat others and how we show love to others in our lives and in our world. The days have been full of allsorts of activities including having a chance to see the lads amazing acting skills with a story telling of the Zacchaeus story as part of the day. It’s been a great couple of days so far and I expect no less from the next couple!

We have recently welcomed the year 8’s from St Peter’s exploring the theme ‘Growing Together in Faith’ also thinking about the words of St Francis of Assisi ‘Spread the Gospel at all times and where necessary use words’. The day involved many activities from games to dramas to film clips, all helping to explore how we live our lives especially during the journey through school over the next few years.

We had a great few days in Our Lady’s with a different year group each day. With lower school we explored the theme of ‘Love One Another As I Have Loved You’ and the upper school explored the theme ‘I Am With You Always’. There were games, film clips, discussion, dramas and group work involved in some fun packed days which helped everyone to reflect on how we value ourselves and others, and looking at what affect our choices in life have on our relationships.

SS Peter and Paul’s, Widnes

It was a fantastic day spent with the year 11’s at SS Peter and Paul’s. The day was put on for the year 11’s to sign up to, and it gave them a chance to get away from the stress of exams for a day and focus on their lives, their faith, and the journey ahead. The theme of the day was ‘The Lord is With You’ and involved three different workshops looking at love of self, love of neighbour and love of God. The day had lots of fun and also time for reflection and sharing. The day culminated with a mass that had involvement from everybody in some form. It was a great day for all!

This was the first time of working with Christ the King, and we’re already looking forward to a repeat next time. We spent a day with the year 7’s and the next with the year 8’s both looking at the theme ‘Who is the Person of Jesus Christ?’. The day’s started with lots of fun and games with a bit of singing for good measure too. We then moved into workshops with art, drama, reflection, discussion, film clips and even some meditation. The afternoon was spent back together and started out with ‘praise aerobics’ before moving into reflecting on Christ in our lives and how we can be Christ for others. A day packed full of fun for everyone!

After our previous mission in Southport, we only moved a bit down the coast to return to St Mary’s once again. It was decided to try out a different format for Mission Week this year and so we spent a whole day with each year group during the week, finishing with year 11, 12 and 13 all together on Friday. It was a fantastic week exploring the theme of ‘Be Reconciled’ and looking at how we can be reconciled with God, each other, the world and ourselves. We explored numerous types of conflict within our world and thought about how reconciliation is not only an option but also a necessity at these times. The school was challenged to take a step out from what our world tells us day in day out - that conflict is entertaining and unavoidable - and to seek reconciliation on a personal, social and global level as well as in our individual relationships with God. We as a team had a fantastic time with the young people of St Mary’s and their enthusiasm really energized us and made the mission a real pleasure to be a part of.

It was an amazing couple of days with Sr Helen in the middle of November. Firstly on Sunday 15th at De la Salle school, where not only did we hear inspiring words from Sr Helen but also Gee Walker, the mother of Anthony Walker, about the importance of forgiveness and reconciliation in life. Secondly was a morning with Sr Helen at St Mary’s, Lowe House, for about 300 young people from schools across the Archdiocese (and beyond!) where once again she left people awestruck with her words and even spent time answering questions to the whole group and chatting away to people afterwards too. Sr Helen even had time to join us for lunch at Lowe House before dashing off to another part of the country to share her amazing story. A BIG thank you to Sr Helen for taking time in her busy schedule to share with us here in the Archdiocese of Liverpool.

We were glad to welcome back, for a second year, the year 7’s from St Peter’s. Once again the day followed the theme of ‘We Are One Body’ helping to focus on the gifts and talents of individuals and how we bring them together as one body, as a school and as a church. The days involved games, artwork, film clips and prayer, and proved to be a hit with the whole of year 7.

It was fantastic to spend the week in Christ the King for what proved to be an amazing week. The focus of the mission was ‘Let Your Light Shine’, helping us all to explore how we can let God’s light shine through us by using the gifts, talents and traits that he has given us. It definitely proved to be a great chance for many people, staff and young people alike, to let their light shine throughout the week in the many activities and sessions that took place in the hall and the classroom.

What a day we had with the lads in Year 12 looking at the theme ‘Follow Me’. The day explored how we can be disciples and follow the Lord just as the first disciples answered Jesus call to follow him. This involved going fishing (well, a version of fishing with a home made fishing rod, blue material and paper fish!) and taking on challenges that required showing discipleship towards each other. The lads got stuck into everything that we presented them with and the day was a hit with everyone.

We welcomed the guys and girls to Lowe House for a day full of fun. The theme of the day was ‘Come Follow Me’ and explored our journey through life and where God is in that journey. The day involved all sorts of activities with artwork, drama, discussions, film clips and finishing with prayer to bring to the Lord the whole day.

It was great to have St Edmund Arrowsmith back, this time the year 9’s being our guests. The day focussed on the theme ‘Prepare the Way of the Lord’ and involved many different activities including three different workshops. During the day we explored the school mission statement and how we can live that out in our everyday lives. The three workshops looked at being part of a community and the role we play, prayer and the relationship we have with God, and mission statements, what they mean and how we can live them out. It was a number of fantastic days that really helped to bring the focus back to living out mission as part of the school community, local community and church community.

The last retreat days of this term have been with the year 7 girls at St Julie’s where we have been exploring the theme of ‘Come Follow Me’ and our journey with God through life. They have been some action packed days at the school with each form group with games, singing, video clips and artwork looking at the gifts and talents God has given us for our journey. If that sounds a lot, I haven’t even spoken about the afternoon, with a discussion about Mary’s journey when she was told she had been chosen to bring Jesus into the world, and a chance to reflect on God’s role in our lives. To finish the days we entered into a time of prayer through meditation and everyone had just about enough energy to say goodbye!

It was great to welcome the year 7’s from St Edmund Arrowsmith to the Life and Soul Café over a number of days. Each day was spent with different form groups exploring the idea of ‘Mission’ and particularly taking a deeper look into the school’s Mission Statement. The day was full of all sorts of activities that everyone thoroughly enjoyed and especially focussed around the community game in which small groups each represented a different community and attempted to show why theirs was the best through a mission statement and poster/advert. These communities ranged from the ‘singing everything community’ to the ‘eating chocolate community’ and really helped explore what being part of a community and living by joint values is really about.

What a day we had with the whole of year 12 from St Julie’s. The theme for the day was ‘God does not see as human beings see; they look at appearances but God looks at the heart’. The day explored what we value and how we perceive ourselves and the people around us. This was done through many activities including a fantastic fashion show from the newspaper and bin bag range. Also included were workshops in dance, drama, art, and a ‘values auction’ that were then shared with the rest of the year group. The day moved into a more reflective end which included a video clip and drama that focussed on the love the Father has for us and the sacrifice Jesus made for each of us.

De la Salle, St Helens – Mission Week

We were glad to be able to celebrate a second mission week with our most local school De la Salle. After our previous mission a couple of years ago we returned this year to explore the theme ‘Be Reconciled’. It was a great week and first mission of the year, the team being ‘extended’ with almost 100 pupils helping out in many different ways. The week was very challenging with video clips of the parents of Jimmy Mizen particularly striking a chord with many. This and many songs, games, dramas, activities, teachings and sharing of stories made up a week many will remember. The whole week lead up to a fantastic celebration with the wider community on Thursday evening and House masses on Thursday afternoon and all day Friday.

It was great to welcome the year 7’s from John Fisher to explore the theme of ‘New Beginnings’. It was a great chance to think over the new beginning at a new school and also to think about the new beginnings we are able to make in our lives. The day was full of fun and games, and included many activities including looking at the ‘new beginnings’ made by people in the Bible when they had a transforming experience. In our prayer towards the end of the chance we had a chance to reflect on our lives and look at what we are going to do to make a new beginning to reach our dreams for the future.

We could tell we have officially started a new year when we welcomed our most local school for our first retreat days of the year. It was great to meet the newest members of the school and explore the theme ‘Be Reconciled’ which will help in preparation for the mission week of the same theme! The day was full of fun with games, artwork, drama and prayer all playing their part. There was an interactive story about Zacchaeus that was just one example of Jesus showing love to someone, who many thought didn’t deserve it, and the group thought about how they could show love to those around them as well.








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