News and Events
Josephite Conference
A number of the Tasmanian Sisters joined with other Srs of St Joseph from throughout Australia and New Zealand for the Mary MacKillop Centenary Conference at Mount St Joseph Girls’ College in Altona on August 15th and 16th.
The Conference guest speaker was Dr Maria Pascuzzzi, a Sr of St Joseph from Brentwood, Long Island, USA who spoke to us as a Biblical scholar looking through ecological lenses.
Maria lead us in an exploration of
- living in a time of transition for religious life and
- participating in justice and ecological issues today.
She challenged us to, not only be close to Jesus and recognize the spirit of God in our midst, but to allow ourselves to be transformed by the Gospel – to allow Jesus to show us what a Gospel imagined life looks like.
She suggested that if Mary MacKillop and Julian Tenison Woods had a message for us today it may well be as simple as “Just get on with doing whatever you can, wherever you are”
We left the Conference alive with the energy of the challenge that Maria threw to us to allow the words of Scripture empower us to do our part in restoring God’s vision for our world.
Many of the Sisters were also able to attend the Melbourne Premiere of the Mary MacKillop Mass, a New Symphonic Choral Work, a new work by Nicholas Buc for choir, symphony orchestra and soloists. With words selected to represent various chapters of Mary MacKillop’s life, interspersed with words from the Mass, this new work reflects Mary’s teachings, personal struggles and beliefs. Andrew Wailes conducted the performance by the Australian Catholic University Choir, the Box Hill Chorale, Music Glenelg Festival Singers, the Royal Melbourne Philharmonic Orchestra and outstanding soloists. Those who attended were very moved by the experience and felt it was an outstanding celebration of the Centenary of Mary’s death.
