Welcome to the end of Week 9! Our Prep Bilbies did a wonderful job on assembly today, presenting on the theme of ‘The Season of Creation’.  Throughout their prayer they recognised all the gifts we find in God’s creation, and prayed that we may live together with creation with hearts full of love.  

With the season of creation happening, we are hosting a number of events next week at the school, where we will be showcasing the amazing environmental initiatives we have in place in, placing our school value of Stewardship, where we are called to care for God’s creation, our common home, and the front of our minds.

On Tuesday we are hosting ‘EcoWarriors’, where a number of students from schools around the diocese will come to our school to engage in an environmental awareness and action day.  These students will engage in a range of activities, including a tour of our school where we will showcase some of our wonderful eProjects around the school.

On Wednesday, we are hosting a ‘Catholic Earthcare Workshop’, for teachers from around our diocese.   Here teachers will make the link between our Catholic faith and the work we do in sustainability education, and of course, we will again be showing off some of our environmental initiatives we have here at St Benedict’s.

Finally, on Thursday, we are hosting our community for our annual ‘EcoFest’, which our Year 6 students have been busily preparing.  This will show off the environmental initiatives we have at each year level around the school, as well as what some of our local community groups are doing to care for creation.

This weekend, I will be taking our staff for a ‘Contemplative Spirituality Day’, where we are ‘Focussing on the wonder of Ordinary Things’.  Our staff will engage in a range of contemplative activities around the Ross River to depthen their understanding of contemplative practices, both in their own lives, and to be transferred into the classroom,  This is always a wonderful day, and a way in which our staff really engage with the Contemplative element of our Benedictine charism.  

This week I would like to share with you a YouTube link which our staff will be engaging in on their day titled ,’A Good Day’ by Br Steindl-Rast.  It reflects on the gift we see in creation from God each day - it is a lovely reflective video which encourages us to live in the “right now” and would recommend having a watch, perhaps to start your weekend.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Zl9puhwiyw 

Pax,

Nick