OLV school

Dec 9, 2011

This Sunday (11 December @ the 10.00am Mass) our parish hosts the school community for an end-of-year school Mass.  The 10.00am Mass will be followed by a gathering of parishioners and the school students, teachers and families in the presbytery garden.

It has been an extraordinarily difficult year. Someone commented to me that there has not been a year as difficult and disruptive to city life since the war. That is undoubtedly true. Our prayer is that these difficult days are now past. We pray for stability in the earth, and even more we turn to God for stability, peace and joy in every event and moment of our lives.


It has been encouraging to see our city community (with support from around the country and the world), and the smaller communities within the city, working together throughout the year to support and rebuild.  We have seen many examples of this in our own parish and school community.


In this our Catholic community has a significant advantage over secular institutions and schools. We do not simply rely on the goodness and generosity of people. We turn to God, and to the life of God gifted to us through the sacramental life of the Catholic Church.


This gift of God is the heart of the life of a Catholic school. A Catholic school exists to communicate the life of God using the teachings and tools of the Catholic faith.

It was the Sisters of Mercy who founded our parish school in 1956.  They lived at the VIlla Maria convent where their lives centred on God. They began every day with prayer and Mass in the chapel. Each day concluded in the chapel.  Throughout the day they took moments and minutes to remind their students that everything depended on God. 

Twenty years later, in the mid 1970’s, the NZ schools Integration Act defined this special character of a Catholic school: 

“a Roman Catholic School in which the whole school community, through the general school programme and in its’ Religious instructions and observances, exercises the right to live and teach the values of Jesus Christ. These values are as expressed in the Scriptures and in the practices, worship and doctrine of the Roman Catholic Church, as determined from time to time by the Roman Catholic Bishop of the Diocese of Christchurch.”



As we come to the end of this school year it is timely for us to remember that our school is a treasure. This treasure has been entrusted to us by earlier Catholic generations. Their generosity built this school. Today we govern, manage and support our school on behalf of our bishop who owns the school.

It is my prayer that at the end of this challenging year, the school community rests well and returns refreshed to continue God’s work in this place in 2012.

0 Comments

Submit a Comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Latest Posts

Ascension

Ascension

Most people think of the Ascension of Jesus as being a ‘departure’ moment. Jesus was here and now he is gone. We imagine Jesus going up into the clouds and the disciples waving farewell from below.
This is an unhelpful image.
It is essential that we understand what does happen and what does not happen in the Ascension event.
It would be easy to wrongly think that in his ministry showed us how to build the city of God on earth, and now he has gone and the mission is left to us.

touching the sacred

touching the sacred

A few years ago I was on Rēkohu Chatham Islands for what has become one of Aotearoa New Zealand’s most sacred days, the ANZAC day of remembrance in gratitude for those who gave their lives, their health, their youth, their service that we may live in peace.
The art above was produced by one of the students at the local Te One school.

every which way

every which way

A good number of Food For Faith readers have discovered one of the more recent FFF initiatives, the weekly Homily Studio.
The recording of this half-hour podcast is one of the highlights of my week.

in the room

in the room

Today’s reflection marks the end of the FFF Lent-to-Easter daily email posts. Thank you for your company on this journey.  While these daily posts (for those who have signed up for the Lent / Advent reflections at this link) will take a break until Advent, those who have signed up to receive every post or regular posts at this link.  You might take a moment now to visit this page now to check your email preferences.

During retreat this week I found myself pondering just how difficult it is to accept that God, in Jesus, is really with me today.

disciplined discipleship

disciplined discipleship

As I write I’m nearing the end of retreat days with a group of fifty priests from across the USA.  As I mentioned a couple of days ago the diversity and youth of the group is remarkable with the majority being aged under 40 and a good number ordained for fewer than five years.