Faith and Mission

The past few weeks have been packed with activity on the Religious Education and Faith and Mission front. Last week we had our Year Eleven and Twelve cohorts depart for a three day retreat to The Old Priory in Beechworth and Rutherford Park in Blampied. We could not have asked for better weather and the students were exceptional in the way they participated with such respect and enthusiasm. Thank you so much to all teachers who gave up their time so generously to guide these wonderful young people on the retreat process which gave them time with themselves and God. Thank you in particular to our Year Eleven Student Development Leader, Ms Luecke, who ran our first retreat at that level for several years. Feedback from both staff and students has been glowing.

Our wellbeing leader, Peter Harte, took three students to Joey’s van on Monday night and they all spoke so positively about the experience and the opportunity to serve. Thank you to Peter, Dalena, Anna and Samantha for their volunteering and care.

The same night we took twenty students to the Building Bridges Interfaith Program. At King David school we learnt about their faith and many of their symbols and students shared stories with Mt Hira and Islam and Kilbreda and Nazareth. Our students were great ambassadors  for Killester and we look forward to seeing how the program unfolds after the next five sessions. Thank you so much to Ms Garofalo and Ms Timlin for generously supervising the night. 

Finally, Year Twelve students in school based RE embarked on their first community service  outing to St Kilda Mums in Clayton. There we sorted and packed donated clothes for infants of all ages. This has been the brainchild of Ms Garofalo and the opportunity has been wonderful. St Kilda Mums are a charity that donates clothes and baby products to struggling families and Mums. They do an incredible job and we are so lucky to make this connection with them.

In the next few weeks we will be asking for our Project Compassion Boxes to be returned. If you can encourage or help your daughter with this it would be greatly appreciated. The liturgy on the final day will include Years ten, eleven and twelve drama classes and focuses on the events of Holy Week and the service and inclusivity that Jesus espoused. 

I wish you a safe and Happy Easter to you and your families.

Peter O’Neill

AP Faith and Mission

Year 12 School-based RE Program

St Kilda Mums

In one of our Year 12 School-based RE classes last week we were all lucky enough to get together for an information session held via Zoom, where we were introduced to partnerships manager Gill, who is from the charitable, not-for-profit organisation called St Kilda Mums. Before telling us about the incredible work St Kilda Mums does to help disadvantaged mums all around Victoria, Gill actually told us a bit more about herself and the sort of career pathway that led to her current position working at an organisation that aims to assist others. She gave us an insight into how easy it is to get into social work, and how the fact that she had a degree in Criminology did not matter or impact on her ability to get into a completely different line of work. This was great because it gave us something to think about, career-wise, that we might not have considered before. Gill informed us of how St Kilda Mums provides their support to struggling mums through maternal and child care help, and the donations of prams, cots and kits to enable them to begin their journey as mothers, as well as clothing and other simple luxuries for mums themselves. We watched a video about a woman, Mary, who had come to Australia heavily pregnant and with nothing for herself or her baby. When she had her baby she felt awful and scared about not being able to provide for her, and had to be stuck waiting at the hospital for an extended period of time. This is when social services were able to connect her with St. Kilda Mums and she was given a care package and further support. Seeing the smile on her face and the tears of joy she had because she had received things that we so easily take for granted in our everyday lives such as clothing, toys and even perfume; was really eye opening and showed us just how much of a difference the work that St Kilda Mums makes to women and their children's lives and futures. 

Gill also told us about just how much of a variety in age the women that are in need of support are; with one of their youngest, most recent mums only being 12 years old - which was a shock for some of us to hear. It was inspiring to see Gill speak so enthusiastically about all of the different sorts of tasks some of us will get to undertake when we go to volunteer at the organisation, and being given the opportunity to experience assisting St Kilda Mums is something that we are very lucky to have. The Year 12 School-based RE cohort and I are looking forward to working with St. Kilda Mums, and are very grateful to our RE teachers for organising wonderful community service opportunities, such as this one, for us to engage and participate in!

Ebony Dewadasa (Year 12 St. Theresa)