CONGRATULATIONS to the boys and girls of Primary 4 who recently received the Eucharist, their third Sacrament. May they always stay close to Jesus and may God bless them on their journey of faith. This week the children of Long Tower P4 donated a sum of their money to The Pontifical Society of Missionary Children to help children in Uganda. We thank them for their generosity in caring and sharing with others.

THANKS AND FAREWELL to Mr Patsy McCloskey. Mr McCloskey has been teaching in Long Tower Primary School for 36 years. He came here as a newly-trained teacher in 1972 and has been Vice-Principal since 1988. It was in that year that the amalgamation of the two schools took place – St Columba’s Boys and St Columba’s Girls. We are extremely grateful to Mr McCloskey for his years of dedication and tireless pedagogy to the children of our school. A native of Dungiven he has travelled day after day to share his cheerful, upbeat zeal for intelligent learning with the youngest members of our community. This enthusiasm for Catholic education is his trademark and he communicated it with fairness, good humour and constant prayer. We praise him, we thank him and we wish him God’s finest blessings in his retirement. “And still they gazed, and still the wonder grew, that one small head could carry all he knew.” (Oliver Goldsmith, The Deserted Village).

A THORNHILL COLLEGE CLASS REUNION for those who started in Thornhill in 1968 and left in 1975, will take place in the City Hotel, Derry on Saturday, 23rd August. If you were part of the Thornhill Class of '68 and would like to attend the reunion please contact Mary McLaughlin on telephone: 078 9112 0407 or e-mail marymcl@gmail.com
as soon as possible.