Religious Education & Pastoral Care
Mrs Deb McDouall
Religious Education Coordinator
School mass
A massive thank you to our outstanding young people in Kindergarten for leading our special mass today. What champions you all are! It is heartwarming to see you all grow in confidence to take on special roles in our masses which helps to make it so meaningful and adds to the special occasion. Well done!
A special mention to Chase for his first time serving on the altar, congratulations!
Our next school mass will be our last one for this term. This is scheduled for Friday, 12 September at 10.15am. Our Stage 3 students will be in charge of preparing this mass for us all. See you all there!
DADs
Next week; Tuesday and Thursday, we will have a Father's Day stall running for students to have the opportunity to purchase a small treasure for the special male role models in our young people's lives. There was a special prayer for all Dads said at our mass this morning, and we look forward to the Father's Day BBQ next Friday - don't forget to RSVP!
Year 6
Every year, all Year 6 students across the Diocese sit the annual RE test. It has become a tradition here at St Joseph's to mark this occasion with a visit to the choir section of St John's. It is always facinating to hear the comments 'but it doesn't look high from down there'. ! It's wonderful for our students to be able to see the church from a new angle and to have the opportunity to ask questions. Well done on all our students for their ongoing efforts and for braving the stairs!
Student wellbeing
Last week all students in Years 3-6 joined together to participate in the Kids Helpline's largest anti-bullying lesson for primary schools. We heard these important messages:
- Why bullying behaviour occurs
- Who is affected
- Everyone has a role to play
- How to 'Stand up' in quiet ways
- How to help in 'loud and proud' ways
- What bullying is, and what it isn't
This created lots of positive talk and I encourage students to continue to keep talking about this to ensure we all can recognise bullying and know the best way to respond to that behaviour.
If any families would like to discuss this further I strongly encourage you to reach out.
Our next step in our ongoing efforts to support our young people, is the Healthy Relationships program which will be run in Stage 3 for the last few weeks of Term 3. This program is offered by trained and experienced staff from Centacare Tamworth and we are excited to provide this opportunity to help our young people have the interpersonal skills to use in their hope-filled futures, wherever that may be.
Prayer Retreat
I was fortunate this week to have the opportunity to join with other Religious Education Coordinators, Assistant Principals and Leaders of Pedagogy at Armidale for a Prayer retreat centred around our theme for this year of 'Pilgrims of Hope'. It was a very thought-provoking day which included a tour of the Cathedral with information not widely known, and a visit to a prayer chapel that has only recently opened. It is always refreshing to share these days with others and I am grateful to have these opportunities that help me in my role working with our young people.
The High Altar from the original Cathedral now used in a newly created chapel.
Beautiful traditional Belgian artwork decorates this altar
It was interesting to discover why there was a delay of a number of years in opening the new cathedral!
Built without scaffold!
The Nave
The magnificent East window from the floor level
St Brigid... The stone masons' tribute to their Irish heritage in the High Altar
All carved from one piece of marble!
Tiles representing the waters of Baptism leading to God... all tiny mosaic tiles
Again St Bridget.
From Below
From above!
Where the bell ropes used to hang through a few levels
The High Altar from the original Cathedral now used in a newly created chapel.
Beautiful traditional Belgian artwork decorates this altar
It was interesting to discover why there was a delay of a number of years in opening the new cathedral!
Built without scaffold!
The Nave
The magnificent East window from the floor level
St Brigid... The stone masons' tribute to their Irish heritage in the High Altar
All carved from one piece of marble!
Tiles representing the waters of Baptism leading to God... all tiny mosaic tiles
Again St Bridget.
From Below
From above!
Where the bell ropes used to hang through a few levels
What is a Jubilee?
A Jubilee is a special year of grace and conversion, involving prayer, pilgrimage and sacramental repentance, held every 25 years, or during other years as called for by the Pope.
The most recent (ordinary) Jubilee celebrated was the Great Jubilee of 2000. The most recent Extraordinary Jubilee Year was 2015, the Holy Year of Mercy.
Jubilee celebration has biblical roots, and therefore it presents us with a wonderful opportunity to deepen our appreciation of those roots.
Through a series of concrete rituals, acts and commitments, the goal of a Jubilee year is to inspire and encourage holiness of life among the faithful and therefore to strengthen the Church’s witness to God’s loving mercy in and for the world.
Consecrated persons are invited to live this Jubilee in the way of peace, as captured in the official motto shared by DICLSAL: Pilgrims of hope on the path of peace.
