Education in Faith
Coming Together in Faith and Action
St Anthony's School
The Beginning of Lent
We understand that Lent is the important period leading up to Holy Week and our remembrance and celebration of the death and resurrection of the Lord. As Mr Ru mentioned in his From the Principal Page, Prayer, Fasting, and Almsgiving are concepts that our students learn about and aim to practice during Lent. This means not only do we take more of an opportunity to pray together, we also reflect on the ways we can help others.
Our wonderful PFA made pancakes for our students on Shrove Tuesday and all classes unpacked the history of this tradition. Stepping back in time, people would prepare to fast during Lent, giving up many types of food to show their determination to devote themselves to prayer and reflection, thus they would look to use up the eggs and fats in their cupboards, making a pancake type dish on the Tuesday before Ash Wednesday. Over time a tradition was born and our students enjoyed this tasty snack!
When learning about this tradition, Year Four students completed a fun activity where they imaged how different the Shrove Tuesday celebrations may be if different ingredients were involved back when it began. Please enjoy Xavier, Leonardo and Peter's work below. I'm not sure about you but I'm pretty happy we landed on pancakes!
Ash Wednesday marks the official beginning of Lent and our whole school gathered for Mass to receive the blessed ashes. These ashes serve as a powerful reminder that we are each blessed with one precious life. During this Lenten season, we are called to use that life to be kind, compassionate and in service of others. We know that even the smallest actions can make a meaningful difference in the lives of those around us. Please read on to learn more about how we are putting our faith into action through our Project Compassion initiatives.
Project Compassion 2026
Caritas is an amazing charity organisation that we love to support each year. During Lent they host their Project Compassion initiative, where they raise fund and awareness about their fantastic world-wide charity work. A range of resources can be found on their website, including specific stories about people living across the globe who may need support and assistance. Our students will regularly complete lessons using these resources as well, so they can deepen their understanding of how we can serve others, even those we may never meet.
Each of our classrooms will have their own Project Compassion box, where students are encouraged to donate coins when they can. This may be forgoing an icy pole one week, or having some loose change that can be placed in the box.
Supporting this we will also have our school initiatives, which have always been a fantastic strength of our St Anthony's community. The first initiative I would love to unpack now!
Last year we had fantastic success with our Pet Hall of Fame, where photos of pets were displayed in our school for a Gold Coin Donation. Students and staff loved seeing this, and it was really a highlight on our walls!
We are going to do something similar this year, with our Gratitude Gallery!
We greatly appreciate your support with this and all of our initiatives! We know that all money raised is truly spent in a valuable way. Please feel free to start sending photos whenever you are able and we will get to displaying them at school!
God Bless!
Tim O'Mahoney
Education in Faith Leader