Author: Editor

The Shepherdsʼ Play will be performed by the friends of Michael House School. Sadly the school closed in 2019, but some of the teachers and parents and friends are keeping the tradition alive and All Saints has kindly offered to accommodate the play so we can all share in the celebration of the Christmas Nativity. John the organist of All Saints will be playing the piano to accompany the singing.

The Shepherdsʼ play is one of three plays known as The Oberufer Plays. They were first performed by farm labourers and members of the community of Oberufer:- an Island on the River Danube on the Austrian Hungarian border, during Medieval times. The plays were passed down through generations and observed by Karl Schroer, an Austrian Professor who noted them down at the end of the 19th century. They were then edited by his student Rudolf Steiner who also grew up in a rural community in Austria, and translated by A. C. Harwood in the 1940s. These are the plays that are performed at Christmas in Steiner Waldorf Schools throughout the world, as a gift from the teachers to the pupils and parents. No mean feat when you consider the workload of teachers in that term and having to cope with overexcited children as Christmas draws near.

Advent was a very special time of year at Michael House. Each classroom had its own real fir tree decorated with real candles that were lit and Advent songs sung every morning: ”From the Forest bring the boughs of fir and spruce and pine, ring the bells, ring the bells, for now it is Advent time” and “People Look East the Time is Near of the Crowning of the Year” echoed throughout the corridors. Children would do candle dipping, make gingerbread and wreaths and paper stars. On the last days of term the teachers would perform the Paradise Play about Adam and Eve, followed by the Shepherds Play. Different teachers would take the different roles each year, so although the plays are always the same they were always slightly different and were eagerly anticipated….who would play the devil this year, were they better than the teacher who performed it last year? There is also an element of ad-libbing in the middle of the play and references to events in the school or the political situation in the country. In the last few years the Class 10 pupils, 16 year olds would take on the roles of the Shepherds, bringing an energy and hilarity to the performance. The third play – The Kings Play about the coming of the 3 Kings and the other 2 Kings Christ and Herod is a much darker play and was performed on 6th January, Epiphany. This was only performed a few times at Michael House.

The Shepherdsʼ Play tells the story of The Nativity. It is very simple, with the minimum of props and seems almost austere in this day and age when consumerism has taken over Christmas. Within the play, which has music and singing is the miracle of the birth of Christ. It is beautifully portrayed with just the gesture of Maryʼs arms. Then the Shepherds bring their humble, simple gifts to the Christ child. After all the hustle and bustle of preparations that go on during Advent it is a very calming to watch this play and feels like the beginning of Christmas. The songs and music will stay in your head throughout the festive time. It is an experience not to be missed!

Admission is free. There will be refreshments. A collection will be taken at the end for contributions to cost of heating the church.

Freya James

Earlier this year, Coppice school was visited by OFSTED. The result was that the school was rated as good overall with the Nursey in particular being singled out as exemplary.

There are currently a few nursery places available so if you have a child in your care of nursery age you couldn’t do better than enrol them in Coppice nursery.

For details see the poster below.

It’s a bit hard to swallow isn’t it? I mean come on!  Admittedly there  is a lot of independent evidence that Jesus did indeed exist around the early part of what we now call the first century AD, that he was an inspirational speaker who shook up the Jewish establishment and who was executed by crucifixion. All of that is recorded by Roman historians among others and virtually all modern historians accept that the evidence is overwhelming and in fact more compelling that it is for the existence of historical figures such as Julius Caesar, whose existence no one seriously doubts.

OK so Jesus existed and made enough of a mark to have a footnote in history but  that same ‘history’ confirms that he was crucified. Throughout the period of the Roman Empire where crucifixion was a common form of execution and estimates suggest that up to 1 million people were crucified. There is no record of any survivors! So why should we believe that Jesus was the only exception?

We shouldn’t!  There is no doubt whatsoever that Jesus along with all the other people who were crucified  did in fact die. The Romans were experts, but to be absolutely sure, a spear was  driven into his heart before he was taken down from the cross.  So what’s all this stuff about him ‘rising from the dead?’ about you might ask. Once again it is well documented that the body of Jesus was put into a tomb dug into a rock face and that the tomb was sealed and guarded. Now remember that Jesus’ disciples had run off at the first sign of trouble before he was arrested and one would expect them to be terrified of being rounded up and executed in the same way. In fact they were (terrified) they all went into hiding. It was only a few women who dared to sneak over to the tomb while it was still dark to see if they could finagle  their way into giving him the ‘last rites’ due to a corpse in the Jewish tradition of the day.  They found the tomb empty and spread the word. A few weeks later these same disciples who had run away and hid were standing on street corners and telling crowds of people that Jesus had risen from the dead as proof positive that he was the Messiah that they had been waiting for, for 1,000 years.  Something miraculous had happened to turn cowards into heroes. And why didn’t the authorities simply produce the body to refute what they were saying? Clearly they couldn’t—it wasn’t there!! Are we really to believe that a handful of cowardly despondent men in fear of their own lives  had managed to overpower a guard, move a boulder sealing the tomb, remove the body, hide it so well that it has never been found and then  put their own lives at great risk by  confronting those same people who had shouted for Jesus to be crucified with a made up story of his resurrection?  And this was far from being a flash in the pan. These same people plus the growing number of followers whom they convinced of the truth of the resurrection  of Jesus,  took this message, the Gospel, throughout the known world.  Could all of this really be based on a lie?  However difficult it might be to believe in the resurrection of Jesus isn’t it harder to believe that a collection of mainly uneducated fishermen could make up a story and then sell it to the world?

I don’t think so do you??