Religious Education and Social Justice

Young Mary Production

As we lead up to the celebration of the Feast of Mary of the Cross MacKillop, today our children were treated to a performance of Young Mary by Starrs Productions. 

The play gives insight into the life of Mary as a young child leading up to her work as a sister of the Josephite order. 

Mary MacKillop was born in 1842 in Fitzroy, Melbourne.  On 8 August 1909, she died, having suffered a disabling stroke in 1902. Inspired by a meeting with Fr. Julian Tenison-Woods, Mary MacKillop took her vows at the age of twenty-five, and the religious name, “Mary of the Cross”. In doing so, she founded the congregation of the Sisters of St Joseph. Soon after taking her religious vows, Mary MacKillop founded several schools. Within five years of taking her vows and founding the Congregation of the Sisters of Saint Joseph, Mary had established over thirty schools in South Australia. 

By that time, more than one hundred women had joined the Sisters of Saint Joseph.

Our school was established in 1942, by the Sisters of St Joseph, as part of the Yarraville Parish, and was originally known as St Flannan’s. 

Two Sisters of St Joseph began our school with an enrolment of two students, which grew to 60 in the first year. After the arrival of European migrants and refugees, and because of local industrial growth, the enrolment grew rapidly, peaking at 535 children in 1963. After the opening of a second parish school in the late 1950s, enrolments eased.

The Sisters of St Joseph were involved with our school from 1942 to 1999 and hence it is important that we keep the Charism of Mary MacKillop alive.