Mission & Social Justice

Mission & Identity:

-  Advent

-  Immersion Students

-  Founder's Day

-  Tuesday Mass and Closing Mass times

Social Justice:

-  Christmas Carols at Willowood Aged Care

-  Year 9 Christmas Food Hamper Collection

-  Year 7 Christmas Gift collection for Walgett

-  Collection for the Philippines

-  Social Justice Immersions

Mission & Identity

Advent is drawing near and will officially arrive on Sunday 3rd December with Advent Sunday. In the busyness of our lives it is easy to forget that Advent is an important liturgical season of the Church that prepares us for the significant solemnity of Christmas.

Each year there is always debate about whether our Closing Mass should have a focus on advent or Christmas when we finish so early. We do try and incorporate aspects of each to allow staff and students the opportunity to celebrate both of these together.

On Monday our Immersion students will head off to their various venues for a week of integration into their new communities. We wish them God’s blessing as they seek personal growth and a strengthening of faith as they build relationships with our partner communities. I am privileged to return to St Mary's Primary School Bowraville community next week and I look forward to witnessing firsthand the wonderful work being done within this Indigenous community.

As we make final arrangements for our Founder's Day I pray that this day will be a day based on interfaith dialogue and respect for difference.  The focus will be the Gospel Spirituality Values of Respect, Faith, Compassion and Tolerance.

• Tuesday Mass:   8.00am 5th December
• Closing Mass:  10.00am 6th December - Our Lady of Dolours Church

Ms D Dempsey - Assistant Principal Mission & Identity

Social Justice

On Monday Mr Listo again accompanied some of our Year 10 students to Willowood Aged Care. He was accompanied by Ms Whelan, Ms Gan and a choir of very beautiful Pius boy’s to sing Christmas carols to the residents. The residents had a wonderful time both listening to and joining in with the choir as they spread their Christmas cheer throughout the local senior citizen community.

The Year 9 Christmas Food Hamper Collection continues. Students from Year 9 will be coming around to homerooms collecting Christmas type foods to be distributed to the less fortunate in our local community.

The Year 7 Christmas Gift collection for Walgett has begun. Students can drop off a present for a child under the tree that will go to the families in one of our partner schools, St Joseph’s primary school Walgett.  We ask that all presents be wrapped and marked boy or girl and their age to assist in distributing them to the right kids.

Photo:  The Edmund Rice Society continue to collect shoes, light clothing, coloured pencils, sharpeners, rubbers etc for some of the poorest villages in the Philippines.

There are collection points in the foyer for all three drives currently under way, the Year 9 Christmas Hamper appeal, the Year 7 Christmas Gift Giving Tree and the Edmund Rice Society Philippines clothes and shoes collection.

The St Vincent De Paul Matthew Talbot Men’s Hostel toiletries packs for Christmas has completed and all your generous donations have been put into bags to be delivered to Matthew Talbot. There are almost 50 separate packs to be handed out to the homeless men of Sydney, thank you all for your generosity.

The Mission and Identity team will next week be leading twenty seven Year 10 students on five separate social justice immersions. These have grown substantially from four students who went on our first immersion seven years ago to Walgett. The immersions are:

1. St Joseph’s Walgett indigenous immersion
2. St Mary’s Bowraville indigenous immersion
3. St Edmund’s Wahroonga special needs immersion
4. St Gabriel’s special needs immersion
5. Huntington House local social justice immersion

Mr D Blake  -  Social Justice Coordinator