Director of Mission

Archbishop Mark Coleridge, Archbishop of Brisbane and Chair of the Bishops Commission for the 2020 Plenary Council, spoke at a recent Synodality eConference on synodality in practice. It is an interesting word, which seems to be a theme word for our current Pope. To be honest, until listening to Archbishop Coleridge I had not contemplated the true meaning of it at all. It is loaded with canonical and theological significance but broken down simply means a journey of people moving from one space of knowledge/understanding to another through the practice of listening to the spirit. The Archbishop went on to say that this journey that you take when listening to the spirit ‘gets messy’ and is never ‘clean cut’. He continues by stating “if you want things to be neat and tidy and clean cut then this is not the path for you”. I found this interesting and something to focus on for this week.

It demonstrates to us that there is time for teaching and a time for learning. You can only do both when you are listening! To make it even more confusing theological research tells us you can only truly teach when you are learning and learn when you are teaching (I am still working on that one). For now I would like to focus on the listening to the spirit and show you how important this is through faith in action, as always, right here at Marian. It does get messy and is never easy but the students here definitely make it look easy and that is why we are so proud of them. Enjoy this weeks edition and I hope you see how the following segments are echoing how our students and staff are listening to the spirit of the community and each other.

ICare Kits

iCare kit was the social justice initiative of term 2. This year we were able to develop 36 kits. This is an increase on last year and the largest amount we have ever been able to produce. The Community Action Team enjoyed assembling these kits and were delighted to be able to present these kits to the Linking Communities organisation on behalf of the College. The work Linking Communities does is a vital resource in our community and we were pleased we could support their group and the people they help.

The bags that the items are in were also purchased from Cotton On, they were apart of their cotton on foundation range of products which means the cost of the bags goes directly towards one of their programs in Southern Africa or Uganda. Cotton On presented the College with an award of thanks for giving $100 towards their program supplying books and bricks for a school in Uganda.

It showed that the whole College community is listening to the need of others and the spirit to take action. We are forever grateful for the kindness and generosity shown by all.

Youth Mass

Just a reminder that the MCC Youth Mass in on Sunday the 19th of August. This term Yr 7 and 10 students are required to help and support the mass with setup and duties. The College would love to see students with their families attending simply to enjoy a moment of reflection on a Sunday with friends and then share some morning tea and a chat afterwards.

Quite often we field questions and pleas for suggestions on how people can find the time to spend as a family and sometimes we hear how they wish they knew how to separate children from social media devices. I can only offer this as a possible solution of providing a short period of time on a Sunday where they can have a break!

Hope to see you all there.

Plenary Council 2020

We are currently planning to facilitate and contribute to the discussion being held around the Plenary Council 2020. To get the ball rolling I thought I would simply offer a quick definition of what it is. Very broadly a Plenary Council is a meeting of all of the Bishops of a particular area to consider matters that in their view need to be attended to. It is in this time we should be listening to one another and asking ‘What is God asking of the Church (his people) in Australia at this Time?’. It is suggested that to properly answer this question we need to take time to listen, reflect and discern – in our families, in our parishes, in our Diocese and in our case, our Marian community. Marian will be facilitating workshops and leading our community to be part of the Plenary Council in the near future.

MCC Return and Earn: Water bottle initiative REMINDER

The Recycling program in our first term of operation managed to recycle over 230 plastic bottles. All funds were given to Community CareVan who kindly assist the program in a major way.

We are looking to beat this figure this term and hopefully receive further support from the students. It has definitely not been a neat and tidy start as students continue to place their usual rubbish into the recycle bins. Why not have conversation around your table with your childs understanding and listen to how much they care about making a difference. It may result in you starting your own war on waste at home! Remember we are more than happy to accept your recylced bottles from home also. Thanks for the support.

That concludes another article so have a great weekend. Thanks for reading and remember that life is not always neat and tidy but a beautiful mess that can lead to miraculous change.

Please do not hesitate to contact me through the office or on nevilleh@ww.catholic.edu.au.

Kind Regards

Heath Neville

Director of Mission