Celebrate 160 years of Josephite education
Local
Josephite education in Australia began through Mary MacKillop and the Sisters of St Joseph. An August celebration marks the date but Mary’s teachings are alive and well across SA today.
Friday 7 August is promising to be yet another historic day at a rather special site in Adelaide’s inner eastern suburbs.
Dozens of guests are expected to gather at the Mary MacKillop Precinct in Kensington – where Australia’s first saint lived for 11 years in the very early days of the Sisters of St Joseph congregation that she founded – to celebrate a colossal 160 years of Josephite education.
“Come and share your memories and Josephite stories and bring your memorabilia,” said Mary Hemmings a former teacher in Port Lincoln and Peterborough and principal at Whitefriars Catholic school in Woodville, who has been at the fore of the birthday preparations.
Mary (Hemmings) is a Josephite Companion, an order reserved for “people who love the spirit of Mary MacKillop and have a sense of her charism. People who have studied the story of Mary and who love to share aspects of it,” she said. “We meet four or five times a year in Adelaide and across Australia and New Zealand.”
The 7 August festivities will run from 2pm to 4pm and will be followed the next day (Saturday) by a Feast Day Mass at St Joseph’s Chapel to be celebrated by Archbishop Patrick O’Regan.
Acclaimed South Australian videographer Lyndal Redman has been commissioned by Catholic Education SA (CESA) to make a film of the anniversary and in addition to filming on the day, has already travelled to the important geographical Josephite sites of Millicent and Penola.
