I began teaching in 1992. This means that my first Grade 5 students are now 20 years older than I was when I taught them!
Those 30 students, like the many who succeeded them — in my Grade 5 and Grade 2 classrooms at St. Augustine’s, my blended classes at Traditional Learning Academy, my Learning Resource students at Immaculate Conception in Delta, and for the past three years, my Grade 7 students at IC — impacted my life more than any of them will ever know. They became a huge focus of my thinking, my planning, my conversations, and particularly my heart. Even though I stayed home for 10 years to raise the four children who call me “Mom,” I continue to refer to anyone who has spent time in one of my classrooms as “my kids.”
This past May, I attended the CISVA Elementary School Choir Festival with our Drama Choir. At this event, we were introduced to a canon song called Turn by Emil Adler and Julie Flanders. The lyrics were: “If you need a world to belong to, look around, you’re already home. And what you seek, you’ve already found. Turn around to me, you will see no reason to be lonely.”
These words really resonated with me, as I was helping to prepare my Grade 7s for Confirmation and for their departure from elementary school. I thought of how even I often need the reminder that, with God, I am “already home” and that I have “no reason to be lonely.”
Jesus told his apostles, “Do not let your hearts be troubled. You have faith in God; have faith also in me. In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places. If there were not, would I have told you that I am going to prepare a place for you?” (Jn 14:1–2).
Jesus assures us that the Father’s house has many rooms for those who believe and follow him. We get tastes of those rooms in this life. When we feel happy and safe, when we recognize the beauty of creation and experience love, we gain glimpses of our eternal home. St. Paul speaks of this home in his second letter to the Corinthians when he states, “For we know that if our earthly dwelling, a tent, should be destroyed, we have a building from God, a dwelling not made with hands, eternal in heaven” (2 Cor 5:1).
In my farewell speech to the Class of 2025, I stated, “When you feel lonely in life — and you will at times — always remember that the one who knows you best, the one who created you with a purpose, the one who knew you before you were even in your mother’s womb is always there. Turn around to him ‘and you will see no reason to be lonely.’ Lean on your faith, look to your Scripture verses, remember to pray, and strive to discover what lies within you, through the Gifts of the Holy Spirit.”
I then asked the students to look around the room at the faces of their friends, family members, and teachers. I told them, “Whether you stay in touch or not, these people are all part of your story. ‘Look around. You’re already home.’” I reminded them IC Delta will always be a safe place they can call “home.” Their pictures are on the wall, their voices ring through the halls of memory, and their souls unite in faith. Yet even if our physical classroom — “our … tent” — is one day destroyed (as is the case with St. Augustine’s, where there is now a new school!), “we have a building from God … eternal in heaven.”
Each year, I find the goodbyes incredibly painful, but I do find consolation in knowing that our time together in school, in extracurricular activities, and in the parish has simply been a taste of that eternal life in heaven.
To my former students from 1992 to 2025 — “my kids” — please know that I pray for you each day. The “home” we created on earth still holds real estate in my heart, as it hopefully does somewhere in yours. I pray that, one day, we will reunite in the Father’s house.
Until then, may “the Lord bless you and keep you” (Nm 6:24) and remind you that, in turning to him, “you will see no reason to be lonely.”
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