Mission Report – August 27, 2015

Our students enjoyed a long weekend recently because of our boarding tradition. Known as the Exeat Weekend it is a chance for boarders to make the long journey home and enjoy time with family. Staff members took this opportunity to engage in professional development regarding the White Ribbon campaign to end violence against women and to further investigate the Edmund Rice Education Australia (EREA) Code of Conduct for all staff members.

Our Information Technology staff members also led sessions on the latest educational developments in their field. St Patrick’s College has a grand tradition in technology when we include wood, metal, electronics, ceramics and art. We are reminded of the essential nature of any technology: that is, the tools used by the skilled artisan to transform materials. Given this, the pen remains essential technology to transform the blank page into the expressed knowledge of our students.

Our Catholic faith proclaims the single most important and essential piece of technology history has known. This is the Cross of Christ that transforms all Creation. Bernard Lonergan sets out this technology in his -‘Law of the Cross-.

1. Jesus dies because human beings reject him and his message and put him to death. This statement summarises the facts of the biblical account.

2. Jesus by the manner of this death, his submission and his love, and by his forgiveness of those who orchestrate his death, transforms the apparent victory of evil over good into the moral triumph of good over evil. When we fully enter into the Gospel story we are deeply moved by the power of Jesus’ example. The Cross is not a philosophical argument or a magic trick by God but an event that evokes our humanity. It is why boarders return to their families, why society yearns for role models and why great literature will always be on our school curriculum -“ we want to be inspired, strengthened and revitalised at the deepest level of our heart.

3. God confirms this victory of Jesus by Jesus’ resurrection appearances to the apostles and disciples. Our faith confidently boasts that death never has the last word

4. Jesus’ death shows us clearly the thrust and the ugliness of evil in its power to bring destruction to our world. Still today we encounter the pride, anger, envy and laziness that harm God’s creation. However, now that we can recognise evil, we can muster our response.

5. In faith we are moved by the power of Jesus’ example and by its confirmation in the resurrection. Our hearts can identify with Jesus in overcoming evil with good in our own lives. In fact, we become God’s technology through our commitment to reverse the cycle of evil through forgiveness and love. The fact that God has invited us to participate freely in this sacred task is one ground of our human dignity.

The Cross is our most powerful technology because it overcomes that most dreaded fact of evil. The Cross has been given to us as a gift to use in our own lives, so that we may freely choose what is truly good and endure in that choice, knowing that we already share in Jesus’ victory. The Cross is not a symbol of grotesque torture, but the -‘technology’ of love, goodness and beauty. The Cross is our ultimate Code of Conduct to triumph over all violence. This is why we continue to proudly display the crucifix in every classroom.