From the Principal

Dear Blue Mountains Grammar School Families,

The world we make for one another

In these newsletters, I often offer provocations about learning, the future, the ATAR and the possibilities before our young people. Today, I would prefer to consider something that gives all those conversations their purpose: the kind of community we are building, and the kind of people our children are learning to become within it. This week has given us a painful reason to pause.

The news that Helen Haines had been critically injured outside her Wangaratta office, in what police allege was a targeted vehicle attack, was deeply shocking. For many of us, this feels like the news we have become accustomed to hearing from the United States, or places where political instability intrudes into everyday life. It is difficult to reconcile this incident with the Australia we like to imagine: relaxed, approachable and able to accommodate a robust disagreement without someone fearing for their safety.

The motive for the alleged attack on Helen remains under investigation, and we should be careful about claiming to understand it. Yet we can examine our own disposition towards disagreement. What happens within us when someone holds an opinion we dislike? How readily does frustration become contempt? At what point do we allow ourselves to speak about another person as though their dignity depends on their agreement with us?

These are uncomfortable questions and I should ask them of myself as well. I do find them more useful, however, than simply declaring that the world is getting worse. That conclusion can leave us feeling helpless, watching a future arrive over which we believe we have no influence. We have some influence, beginning with the lives closest to our own. We help determine what becomes ordinary in our homes, our workplaces and our school.

It is here that I find myself returning to the Christian story, and to the wisdom of the Bible. Some reading this will share my faith in Jesus. Others may be uncertain, or may feel that his story has little to offer their lives. Even so, I wonder whether we might recognise, in the biblical account of love, many of the qualities we find ourselves longing for in a week like this one.

Paul writes, “Love is patient, love is kind” (1 Corinthians 13:4). He goes on to describe a love that relinquishes pride, treats others honourably, resists quick anger and refuses to make an account of every wrong as its organising principle. It is a love committed to truth, capable of perseverance and unwilling to abandon hope (1 Corinthians 13:4–7). These familiar words make substantial demands upon the way we live.

Imagine bringing that description into the next disagreement at home, the next difficult meeting or the next comment we are tempted to post. What would patience require of us? What would kindness change about our words? Could we explain our position clearly while leaving the other person’s dignity intact? Could we admit that we have misunderstood something, or that another person’s experience has revealed something we had failed to see?

I ask those questions of myself. It is surprisingly easy to admire love in principle while finding reasons to excuse its absence in a particular conversation. We can become so invested in being right that we lose interest in becoming wiser. Growing our minds and enlarging our hearts requires the humility to remain teachable, especially when we feel we are certain.

Jesus gives that humility a practical direction. He describes his purpose as coming “not to be served, but to serve” (Mark 10:45). What might change if we carried that intention into the places where we have influence? A colleague might receive help before reaching exhaustion. A neighbour might find someone willing to listen. A person who disagrees with us might discover that our care for them survives a disagreement.

There is something of this wisdom in the old sayings many of us grew up hearing: “If you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all,” and “Some things are best left unsaid.” They need thoughtful application. There are injustices we must name, concerns we must raise and difficult truths we owe one another. Alongside that responsibility sits the maturity to recognise when a remark will merely wound, when an accusation is unfair, or when our desire for the last word has overtaken our concern for the relationship.

I suspect you and I practise this restraint quite often in our working lives. We pause before sending an email. We reconsider a sharp response. We decide to speak privately, or to ask a question before reaching a conclusion. These are modest acts of self-government, but they matter. They allow people to work through difficulty while preserving trust.

Our children are watching, from our youngest learners to those preparing to leave school. They hear how we describe people who disappoint us. They notice the generosity we extend, the impatience we excuse and whether we can apologise without immediately defending ourselves. As parents and educators, we share the responsibility of giving them something worth imitating. We also give them an important gift when they see us recognise a mistake and begin again.

That possibility of beginning again is central to Christian hope. The Bible offers more than an exacting description of how we ought to behave. It speaks of mercy, forgiveness and lives that can be renewed. In 1 Peter, hope is connected explicitly to the resurrection of Jesus (1 Peter 1:3). Christians place their confidence in a God whose restoring work reaches into suffering and beyond death. That conviction gives me reason to believe that cruelty need not determine what comes next, and that our own failures need not have the final word in who we become.

There is a need to grieve what has happened and still live hopefully. We can take safety seriously, insist upon accountability and offer practical care. We can also attend to the smaller choices through which a community becomes more generous or more guarded. Every response to a person, a challenge or a disagreement contributes something to the life we share. We should make that contribution deliberately.

I am sure the Blue Mountains Grammar School community joins me in holding Helen Haines, her family, her colleagues and those caring for her in our thoughts, with heartfelt hopes for her recovery. It is right to do so. Our concern must extend across political loyalties and belong to all of us, while taking seriously the particular fears women in public life have expressed. This week should prompt an honest examination of what we are becoming willing to tolerate, and a renewed commitment to the dignity of our neighbours.

We cannot promise our children a world without cruelty. We can help them encounter a community in which love is practised, service is valued and people remain willing to change. We can begin with the next conversation, and with a heart sufficiently humble to ask for help.

Perhaps you might gather your family and talk about how you could love more generously and be good neighbours. A small movement towards a kinder community could begin around your own dining table. 

You may wish to offer a prayer together in your own words, or join me in the prayer below.

God of mercy and steadfast love,

We bring Helen Haines before you, together with all who love her. Be close to her in pain, uncertainty and the long work of recovery. Grant wisdom and steadiness to those caring for her, rest to those keeping watch, and moments of peace when the days feel overwhelming. May she know herself surrounded by love, with hope enough for what comes next.

We ask you also to change us. Examine our hearts with kindness and truth. Forgive the contempt we excuse, the careless words we release and the occasions when we make another person smaller so that we might feel stronger.

Renew our minds and our hearts. Enlarge our capacity to listen and understand. Teach us the patience to pause, the courage to speak truth graciously and the humility to seek forgiveness. Shape our behaviour into something that reflects your love.

Let that love be felt in our homes, our school, our workplaces and our neighbourhoods. Help our children see in us people who are still learning to be good neighbours. Through the lives we touch, may kindness spread, trust grow and communities find their way towards healing.

Keep us faithful in the good we can do today, and hopeful about the change we cannot yet see.

In the name of Jesus, who came to serve, Amen.

Warm regards

Steven Coote 

Principal

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