Liturgy
Community Mass
Thank you to students in Koolyangarra House for their preparation of this morning’s liturgy. Next Friday community Mass will be prepared by Campion House (in advance of their House Day). Thanks also to our exceptional student altar ministers and choir.
All are welcome to Community Mass, whether or not you are Catholic or a regular church-goer. Mass finishes at 8:30am, in time for the start of Homeroom. For families able to stay, the fellowship continues in the Circle of Friends Café.
Community Mass summary
- College Chapel
- Fridays in term time
- Starts: 8:00am and concludes 8:30am
SACRAMENT PROGRAM
Do you have a child in Year 3, 4 or 6?
It is imperative that your child is enrolled in a parish Sacrament Program. Some parishes have already finalised enrolments for 2021.
Doesn’t the school RE curriculum cover the sacrament knowledge?
Yes, that is correct. Most parishes do not require students in Catholic schools to take additional classes in the parish. However, the parish community still needs families to complete the enrolment process in order to celebrate the sacraments.
How to enrol
Contact the parish (parish secretary, sacrament coordinator or parish priest). Parish contact details are available here. The College provides information from some of our local parishes. It is the parents’ right and responsibility to follow up with enrolling their child in the parish.
Please check below for the enrolment dates and procedures for some of our local parishes.
Saint Thomas Apostle, Claremont
First Communion Friday 21 May
Confirmation Friday 27 August
Reconciliation October
Please note that, due to current COVID restrictions on maximum capacity, priority for enrolment will go to families who are in the parish of Saint Thomas Apostle. Please see http://www.johnxxiii.edu.au/view/parent-resources/parish-sacraments
Enrolment forms are available from silvia.kinder@iona.wa.edu.au
St Mary Star of the Sea, Cottesloe/Corpus Christi, Mosman Park
Reconciliation Saturday 27 March
First Holy Communion Sunday 1 August
Information Day: Thursday 29 April, 4-5pm, Parish Centre, 2 McNeil Street, Peppermint Grove.
Confirmation Sunday 7 November
Information Day: 5 August, 4-5pm Parish Centre, 2 McNeil Street, Peppermint Grove.
Enrolment information and contact details for the Sacrament Coordinator may be found here.
Holy Spirit, City Beach
Enrolment information and contact details for the Sacrament Coordinator may be found here
St Mary’s, Leederville
Enrolment information may be found http://www.johnxxiii.edu.au/download/upload/pages/parish-sacraments/leederville_flyer-sacramental-program.pdf
Registration: Goretti – 94449624 smc_secretary@aapt.net.au
If you would like further information about the Sacrament Program:
- If your nearest parish is not listed, search the Archdiocesan website;
- Check the information available on the College website here
- Contact Mary-Anne Lumley mary-anne.lumley@cew.edu.au OR phone 9383 0408
GOOD NEWS for the 4th Sunday of Lent
“God sent his Son into the world that we might be saved through him.”
(John 3:14-21)
The reflection for this Sunday’s Gospel is from Father Michael Tate and is used with permission. Rev. Prof. Michael Tate was a Senator for Tasmania from 1978-93 and Ambassador to The Hague and the Holy See from 1993-96. He is currently Vicar-General in the Archdiocese of Hobart and is an Honorary Professor of Law at the University of Tasmania where he lectures in International Humanitarian Law.
God’s Works of Art
How does God picture us? Of course, He knows each one of us intimately, holding every molecule of our body in existence at every moment. But, how does He think of us?
Does God regard humanity as being on a sort of parole, always having to fulfil certain conditions to the letter, otherwise to be condemned to everlasting punishment? One effect of this view is to make the priest a sort of parole officer. But we read in today’s Gospel that God sent his Son into the world not to condemn it but to save it. So, the condemning portrayal of God does not seem to be on the right track.
What does St Paul reveal as one of God’s favourite ways of regarding us? ‘We are God’s work of art, created in Christ Jesus, to live the good life as from the beginning He had intended us to live it.’
God is an artist working on a cosmic scale. What an artistic imagination: stars, caterpillars, the oceans, rhinoceroses, you, me. We humans are God’s imagining – God’s image-ing – at its best. The Greek word for this work of art is poiema. We get our word ‘poem’ from it. Each one of us is one of God’s poems still being written, we are works in progress.
Just as an artist respects the medium he or she is working in, whether it be oil or crayon or marble or metal, so too God respects us as human beings with free will. Which is why His works of art don’t always look the way He intended!
Now, if one has a work of art in the house, for example a particularly nice vase, or a picture or print that means a lot to you, or perhaps the first sketch by a grandchild, do you put it in the darkest corner of the room, more or less obscured from view? Or do you allow just enough light to fall on it so as to reveal how terrific it is, why it gives you pleasure? Of course, the latter.
Now, if we are God’s work of art, God wants exactly the same. God wants us to be revealed in the light. What sort of light? This is today’s Gospel. Christ our Light came into the world not to condemn it but to save it.
Of course, it might be necessary for the Light to dispel some darkness, some shadow dimension of our lives. In this regard Christ is a healing Light in the first phase of our exposure to him. When the church forgets this and subjects people to the harshest of light so that one can only see the flaws in God’s image, then it is departing from the Gospel.
But Christ not only casts his Light on us to heal us, but to illuminate us in a way which more clearly reveals the love which the Divine Artist has for His creation.
Which is why I look forward to Easter. I look forward to the Paschal Candle being lit in the darkness of the Easter Vigil. That Candle celebrates the victory of Divine Light over the inky darkness of the tomb. As each person lights his or her candle from Christ our Light the church is filled with those flickering candles illuminating each person as one of God’s works of art.
And then we can together say together with St Paul: ‘We are God’s work of art, created in Christ Jesus to live the good life as from the beginning he had intended us to live it.’
© Michael Tate