Mission News

Prayers 

We pray for all members of our community who are mourning the loss of loved ones, that they may be comforted in their grief. May those who have gone before us rest in God’s everlasting peace. Amen.

Community Mass Times

Wednesday Morning - 8:00am

Friday 1st Break - 11.45am

ALL WELCOME!

It was wonderful to have our first football team participate in Mass during first break on Friday. Friday Mass continues our recent (and very Marist!) tradition of prayerfully preparing for our weekend of competition. Gathering at a weekend game to support our teams is one way our community expresses solidarity. So too, gathering for Eucharist is how we express and share our identity as a worshipping community. Of course, it’s always good to pray for the success of our teams!

Our staff and students are always welcome to come along to Wednesday and Friday Masses.

Gospel and Reflection

Excerpt from Sunday’s Gospel (John 15:9-17)

Jesus said to his disciples: 

'As the Father has loved me, 

so I have loved you. 

Remain in my love. 

If you keep my commandments 

you will remain in my love, 

just as I have kept my Father's commandments 

and remain in his love… ‘

This week, in the lead-up to Mother’s Day on Sunday, our college celebrates mothers and mother figures. With Wednesday evening’s Mother and Son Mass and breakfast at the college on both Thursday and Friday mornings, we have occasion to share our gratitude for our mums and mother-figures who love us with a deep, unconditional, and nurturing love.  

Sunday’s readings tell us that the truest love is found in God, our alpha and omega. In the second reading from St John, we read that God “loved us so much” and God’s love lives in us. This suggests being immersed in love, like an ocean, and that love is also alive within us, like a flame. For so many of us, the nearest we can imagine to such love is the mother-love we experience from infancy to adulthood, even after our parents have long passed on.  

Christians witness to the belief that God’s love was poured out in the most incredible way in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus. And because God suffered in and through Jesus, we trust that God’s love accompanies us in our times of suffering, pain and grief, too. Recent disturbing acts of violence against women are causing immense suffering. Too many women have felt the cruel edge of love which has been distorted, broken and abused. The effect of such ugliness ripples out to the whole community: people feel hurt and angry. St Thomas Aquinas believed that anger had the ability to move the will to justice. Yet justice at its most powerful is accompanied by merciful love. No matter how difficult, love calls us to deal in words and actions which heal rather than harm. 

Love is a virtue which we recognise in mothers in particular this week. For our students, it’s an opportunity to acknowledge the gift of mother-love in their everyday life: in the daily drop offs to school, training or music lessons, the caring hugs, the helpful reminders, the listening, the help with homework, even the sometimes unwelcome yet necessary boundaries! 

So, for our mothers and mother-type figures, we pray with Mary the mother of Jesus, whose grace and strength as a universal mother guides and inspires us: 

+ God of life, we pray: 

For our mothers, grandmothers, aunts, and all those who love us. 

May they know the value of who they are and all they do to guide and nurture us And may they know by our words and actions how much we love them 

For mothers who are grieving children who have died or are estranged,  

May they be comforted in their enduring grief and pain. 

For mothers and all women who are impacted by domestic and family violence 

May they gain support, safety and financial security as they seek to live dignified and peaceful lives. 

For mothers who are physically, mentally or emotionally unwell. 

May they receive care and rest to heal, and may they be gently held in love. 

For mothers who have died.  

May we who remember them and feel sorrow at their loss, trust that they are forever at rest in God’s loving arms. 

For mothers who are exhausted and over-burdened by the demands of caring for children 

May they receive compassion and understanding, rest and respite to live fully 

For all who accept the responsibility and privilege of mothering, 

May they face the challenges on the journey with wisdom, grace, joy and humour. 

Loving God, bless our mothers. 

Mary our good mother                         pray for us

St Marcellin Champagnat                    pray for us

St Mary of the Cross MacKillop          pray for us

And may we always remember           to pray for one another

Amen. + 

Mother’s Day Evening Mass

The College warmly invites all mums and/or mother-like figures and their sons to the Marist College Ashgrove Mother’s Day Mass on Wednesday 8 May from 7:00pm. Guests are invited to share the Eucharist together and celebrate the bond between mothers and their sons at this special occasion. Supper will follow.

Tickets: Tickets are free for families, for catering purposes please register your interest by 8:00am Wednesday morning. 

Mother's Day Evening Mass 2024 | Humanitix

For further information please contact Jenna Harding, hardingj@marash.qld.edu.au

Vinnies School Sleepout

On average, over 116,000 Australians experience some form of homelessness every single day, with over 1.4 million having experienced homelessness within the past 10 years. This number continues to rise as the increasing costs of living make it harder to find affordable housing. Worsening mental health issues and the tragic impact of domestic and family violence in our communities are also contributing factors.

To raise awareness of the complex reality of homelessness, we have decided to host a St Vincent De Paul school sleepout on Friday 14 June 14 at the College. The sleepout will feature workshops and activities by Vinnies staff and volunteers who will share with participants some of the difficulties and harsh realities that people affected by homelessness experience on a daily basis. 

This opportunity is open to our senior students. As an overnight event, a simple breakfast and dinner will be included. 

The Sleepout is a symbolic action of solidarity with people whose everyday lives are a struggle. It is the small things that we can do to bring attention to this issue of justice and human dignity. 

The Sleepout will commence at 5:00pm on Friday 14 June and conclude at 7:00am the following day. 

Senior students interested in being part of the St Vincent De Paul school sleepout are asked to complete the expression of interest form sent out via email last week.

The Distinguished Gentleman's Ride

Our staff member Ben Cribb is riding in The Distinguished Gentleman's Ride again this year to raise funds and awareness for men's health on behalf of Movember, and he needs your help.

Movember is the world’s largest men’s health organisation focused on universal, game-changing, and realistic outcomes for prostate cancer and men's mental health. You may have seen on the news a couple of weeks ago the advances just recently made by Australian doctors who have discovered a new and more thorough way of detecting and fixing Prostate cancer in our men. Discoveries directly funded and assisted by this cause and the Movember foundation.

Prostate Cancer Statistics

• Prostate cancer is the most common cancer in men. 
• 307,000 men will die from prostate cancer each year.

Suicide Prevention – Men’s Mental Health

• Suicide is the biggest killer of men aged 20-39, with ¾ of all suicides being male.
• 510,000 men die from suicide each year, that's one every minute.
• In Australia, we lose a good man to suicide every 3 hours, every day, every year. We need to do everything we can to stop this desperate situation.

Ben said, "We must teach our men folk to talk. "It ain't weak to speak" is a sticker I saw the other day on the back of a ute. What a great start that sticker is. We must educate our boys so that they will never think that this could ever be the only answer to their problems."

Please support Mr Cribb on his ride by going to 

https://www.gentlemansride.com/fundraiser/BenCribb401923 

and making a donation to help fund men's health programs, which will help benefit men all over the world.

Ozanam Leadership Camp

A reflection by George Kettle, Year 11 (Slattery):

Over the past weekend, Lachlan Vink, Jaden Bush and myself embarked on a camp for the St Vincent De Paul, Ozanam Leadership Program with over 60 people from Brisbane, Toowoomba, Cairns and Townsville.

Following in the ways of the Charity’s founder Frederick Ozanam, the Ozanam Leadership Program (OLP) aims to empower grade 10 and 11 students with the skill of servant leadership through a combination of activities that live out St Vincent De Paul’s values of mission, vision and to put faith in action helping to carry out the known phrase ‘good works’ and helping others with a hand up.

We embarked on our journey to the Emu Gully campground near Toowoomba early on Friday morning. Awaiting us was a combination of mentally and physically challenging activities requiring every person to speak up and lead not only from the front as most people are familiar with, but also the middle or the back. Our first challenges were particularly challenging for some as we had just come off the bus and were suddenly plunged into waist-deep mud. Here we faced the gruelling challenge of pulling a cannon not once but twice through. Then, as the beautiful sunset from the range emerged we were greeted by a foreboding message as were soon to find out our sanitation and showers were comprised of buckets, with the water pressure relegated to a mere trickle. Along the camp, through a blindfolded night walk, building a bridge, carrying a stretcher through mud and paintball we drew closer to our comrades, feeling confident to express ourselves if we believed a different path should be taken and learned to understand the importance of trusting in others, and putting your team and objective above yourself. Furthermore, the reoccurring ANZAC stories entrenched into us the importance of mateship, and as we began to focus on our objective more than our teammates, how important it is to ensure your teammates are going along well. As we began our descent with a stretcher and the muddy ground beneath us began to give way and the once solid path became mush with fellow participants sliding all over the place. This, as well as so many other activities, proved a basis to learn and grow our leadership skills.

The three of us will now be attending more leadership meetings and advocacy events over the next term or so as we work towards our completion of the program in term 4.

Birthing Kits

Last Thursday, as an activity connected to International Women’s Day, our Year 12s spent their Period 6 ASH lesson assembling Birthing Kits. Beginning with the essential step of sanitising their hands and putting on gloves, students next took responsibility for each packing a kit containing a plastic sheet, pair of gloves, bar of soap, sterile scalpel, pieces of gauze and string. Once bagged and compressed, the kits were boxed for sending to Birthing Kit Foundation Australia for distribution. 

The contents of the kits surprised many students: they learned that minimising the risk of infection and death for mothers and babies in childbirth took providing something as basic as gloves and soap.

Assembling the birthing kits was both a practical action and an important opportunity to learn about the simple ways pregnant women in many parts of the world can be supported to deliver their babies safely. It was also a powerful reminder that all women and their babies deserve access to the resources and medical care they need to survive and thrive beyond childbirth. 

Sony Foundation Camp

Year 11 students are invited to apply to volunteer to help with this year’s Sony Foundation Camp. If you have any questions about the Sony Foundation Camp, please don’t hesitate to speak to a member of the Mission team.

Emmanuel City Mission

The Marist College's MATES program is partnering with Emmanuel City Mission in south Brisbane to support the vulnerable in our community. Emmanuel City Mission provide meals, shower and washing facilities, clothing and toiletry packs, and a place where visitors can feel safe. Marist College hopes to partner with Emmanuel City Mission by sending students to the centre to cook a meal for their visitors and share conversations. The centre relies on donations from the community and has asked the college to sponsor the meals that our students will make. Sponsorship of each meal ranges in price from $300 to $350.

If you are a company owner or worker who would be willing to help the college regularly sponsor a meal or part thereof, please reach out through our mates@marash.qld.edu.au email. We would hope to send students to the centre and sponsor a meal at least once a month. Your contribution will directly impact those in need and support our students' service-learning journey. To sponsor a meal or learn more, contact us at mates@marash.qld.edu.au.

Stationery Aid

It’s been wonderful seeing volunteers in Room 801 on Friday mornings (7:30am-8:20am) to help out with cleaning and sorting stationery for Stationery Aid. This is a great way to earn MATES points and contribute to a really valuable cause.

Stationery Aid donations will be gratefully received. Please use the blue bins provided outside the Mission Office.

For more information about Stationery Aid visit the website: https://stationeryaid.org/.

St Vincent de Paul and the Environment Group

Vinnies and the Environment Group meetings will continue alternating Thursday during Break 1B in Room 801. All students are welcome.