Ministry Coordinator News
Greetings to our St Joseph's Catholic College family. The students, staff and families from St Clare's Catholic College and St Joseph’s Primary, Taree have been experiencing difficult times with stories shared of homes and businesses that have been lost within these communities. I hope everyone has been safe over the past few days with the recent weather we have been having and I ask that we keep the communities of Taree, Wingham, and the wider Manning Region in our prayers and thoughts.
A new Pope:
During the past few weeks, the Catholic community around the world have been introduced to a new Pope, Pope Leo XIV.
Here’s some information we know about Pope Leo XIV:
The new Bishop of Rome was born Robert Francis Prevest on September 14, 1955, in Chicago, Illinois, and has taken the new name Pope Leo XIV.
He studied first at the Minor Seminary under the guidance of the Augustinian Fathers
In Rome, he was ordained a priest on June 19, 1982, at the Augustinian College of Saint Monica
Was sent to the Augustinian mission in Chulucanas, Piura, Peru (1985–1986).
Then was appointed vocation director and mission’s director of the Augustinian Province of “Mother of Good Counsel” in Olympia Fields, Illinois (USA).
He is the first American to be appointed Pope.
Why did he take the name Leo?
The last pope to take the name Leo was Leo XIII, an Italian who led the church from 1878 to 1903. That Leo softened the church’s confrontational stance toward modernity, particularly in relation to science and politics, and laid the foundation for modern Catholic social thought.
Vatican watchers said Prevost's decision to name himself Leo was particularly significant given the previous Leo's legacy of social justice and reform, suggesting continuity with some of Francis's chief concerns.
His first address to the people.
In his first words as Pope Francis's successor, uttered from the loggia of St Peter's Basilica, Leo said, "Peace be with you," and emphasised a message of "a disarmed and disarming peace" dialogue and missionary evangelisation.
“Together, we must try to find out how to be a missionary church, a church that builds bridges, establishes dialogue, that’s always open to receive — like on this piazza with open arms — to be able to receive everybody that needs our charity, our presence, dialogue and love,” Leo said in near-perfect Italian, mentioning the saint considered the first pope.
Vince Cooper
Ministry Coordinator