Parish expands commitment to Season of Creation
News
The newly formed Holy Family Catholic parish has continued, and expanded, the Blackwood Catholic community’s tradition of celebrating the Season of Creation.

Every year Christians around the world celebrate Season of Creation from September 1 to October 4.
Since 2017, Blackwood parishioners have held a prayer service in Mercy Grove, a site in Belair National Park which they have developed and maintained.
This year the Mercy Grove committee decided to extend its focus to celebrating the Season of Creation with activities throughout the month.
Two retired art teachers, Marie Baker and Jacob Van Eyk, helped the parish to interact with nature in different ways and create symbols of hope for Indigenous people and of the environment. The symbols were used in the Mercy Grove service.
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Marta Cunningham collected a variety of seeds that were distributed to parishioners after Sunday Mass.
On Safeguarding Sunday, Barbara Colla organised symbols of hope from nature for children to take forward in the entrance procession, and Jenny Horne organised potted petunias as a gift for every child to look after.
Krys Sawon organised a talk from Onkaparinga Council’s Waste Management Team. Parishioners learned about how to use their bins more effectively and were given a list of recycling places for waste. The parish now has a small recycling effort in the Blackwood church foyer.
The annual Mercy Grove event had to be held in Our Lady of The Way Church because the ground in the National Park was wet. However, the event was well attended with representation from other churches, the Mitcham Hills Inter-Church Council and the Diocesan Ecumenical and Interfaith Commission chair, Associate Professor Stephen Downs.

Marie Baker and her art ‘pupils’
In his commentary on the bible readings, Deacon Tee Ping Koh said while the task of addressing environmental and social problems may sometimes appear as daunting as the building of the first temple, like the young Solomon we should act knowing that ‘the Lord God … will be with [us]’.
Deacon Koh also reminded members of the congregation that they had much to contribute when he cited Professor John Wiseman, a climate activist and author of Hope and Courage in the Climate Crisis (2021), who wrote that, along with scientific, social and technological innovation, we need ‘simple human behaviour’ like compassion, respect, creativity and imagination.
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After prayerful reflection, accompanied by photos of Mercy Grove sites on the church walls, people shared their experiences and commitment to nature.
Bob McEvoy spoke about the church’s walking group that often walks in National Park and Jill Tierney referred to the Yookamurra Wildlife Sanctuary in the Murraylands. Elizabeth from Emmaus parish shared her joy at contemplating a beautiful tree outside the church and her concern at the reduction in the number of insects. Peter Smailes underlined the importance of paying attention to the parts of God’s Creation that can’t be readily seen like the fungi and microbes underground.
Peter and Eleanor Van Eyk used magnifying glasses to examine small critters in the garden and later shared their amazement at the patterns in a snails’ shell and the importance of not killing even the smallest of creatures such as the inch worm Peter found.
Children from School of the Nativity, Aberfoyle Park, provided artwork from The Lorax, an environmental fable by Dr Seuss.
Pauline Webster, chair of the organising group, said the Mercy Grove service proved an opportunity for the newly formed Holy Family Catholic parish to bring communities together.
- Mercy Grove is in Belair National Park. It can be accessed at any time for prayer and contemplation. It is situated just below the Upper Sturt Tennis Club courts at 140 Upper Sturt Road, Upper Sturt.