2023 | ISSUE 18 | Identity News

Identity News

ACU School Leaders Program Opportunity for Gospel Spirituality Prefect

As a Gospel and Spirituality Touchstone Prefect, Josef Paatsch has been nominated and has been accepted to attend the ‘2023 ACU and MACS International School Leaders Program’ for Year 11 students. This is an amazing opportunity for Josef. This Australian Catholic University School Leaders Program is taking place in Rome and London and provides leadership formation for Year 11 Catholic school leaders through an immersion in the Catholic tradition and Western civilisation.

Taking place in the historic sites of Rome and London the program focuses on some of the major themes arising from the history of the Church and the development of the West. Uses a range of teaching modes and learning activities. Deepens participants’ reflections on their own faith and sharpens their intellectual curiosity about the traditions to which they belong. It also serves as a foundation for their own leadership and service at school and beyond.

We look forward to Josef sharing his insights on his return.

MACS have created a ‘2023 ACU School Leaders Program’ website, where you can follow the ‘Daily Blogs’ of the immersion.

https://sites.google.com/macs.vic.edu.au/2023acuschoolleadersprogram/home

Advent – Four Weeks of Faithful Preparation

I attended a regional parish meeting at St Mary’s Geelong last night where representatives from Churches across Geelong participated in a workshop with the Ron Huntley, on 'Growing Vital Parishes’. His mission is to share ways to empower local parish teams to inspire the next generation of Catholics in their community, ‘It’s time to renew the organizational health in your Parish and inspire leadership in your community. It all starts by making people great, helping them live the gifts God's given them.’ https://www.ronhuntley.com/ A very big challenge, we are all called to be a part of.

Advent is the perfect time to re-engage with your local church community. It is a time for us to understand that God is always doing something new for us. Unlike the commencement of the new year, the Universal Church begins its new liturgical year on the first Sunday of Advent. Advent is all about watching and waiting. The word ‘advent’ comes from the Latin adventus, which means ‘coming’ or ‘arrival’. Is a season of waiting and preparation. We await and prepare to celebrate the birth of Christ at Christmas.

We are called during this holy time to wait with anticipation knowing the joys of what is to come with the arrival of Christ. This is the time we come together to celebrate this joy with our loved ones.

One of the traditions for this season is that in Catholic Churches there will be a lighting of a new Advent candle on each of the four Sundays of Advent. There are three purple candles, one pink candle for the Third Sunday of Advent and a white ‘Christ Candle’ that will be lit at Christmas. Often these candles are placed in an Advent Wreath. The wreath is traditionally a circle of evergreen leaves and is a symbol of God’s endless love and mercy.

As Christmas draws near, may it be a time of quiet reflection on the particular gifts God has given to us, and what particular way we may further God’s kingdom by bring some Christmas joy to others by contributing to community initiatives that support the message of this week’s Gospel, such as parish initiatives, a Vinnies hamper and our Bellarine Kinship Adopt a Family, which you can still support as some staff, families and homerooms have also taken up. Or perhaps surprise some one by purchasing a gift to change a life from the Catholic organisation CARITAS who are offering, “Global Christmas cards that give with purpose, assisting the world’s most valuable people in their fight against poverty and injustice." https://www.caritas.org.au/global-gifts/

Why not make a family visit to your local church and be welcomed during the weeks leading up to Christmas, to find a moment of peace in the business of pre-Christmas, to see the Advent candles being lit, and see the nativity scene as we have set up in our reception area awaiting the arrival of baby Jesus, and introduce yourself to the priest before or after mass and tell them you’re from St Joseph’s College and Mary encouraged you to say hello. Our parishes are places of welcome and connection to our neighbours seeking a friendly, safe space to nurture our faith with one another and our God.

Here is a link to all the Parishes in the Geelong region most also have a website and Facebook page to keep you up to date.

https://geelongdeanery.cam.org.au/events/179-ordinary-mass-times-for-churches-in-the-geelong-deanery