Aurora - September 2020

Diocese of Maitland-Newcastle September 2020 | No.205

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On the cover

Photo by Peter Stoop

Featured

Just this weekend past, I had the honour of attending my goddaughter Róisín's baptism at St Mary's Star of the Sea, Newcastle.

Climbing the stairs to enter the church, I caught a glimpse of the sun creating a beautiful glimmer on Newcastle harbour.

I paused for a moment to bask in the splendour. As we sat on the wooden pews awaiting guests, a chorus of kookaburras could be heard through the stain-glassed windows. In commenting to Fr Peter how much I enjoyed the sound, he told me he hadn't heard them for a while, which made it seem even more special.

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Caring for our common home

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Let’s be frank

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School sews stewardship seeds

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All too much, after a fashion

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Waste not, want not

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Caritas groundnuts alleviate food insecurity

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Shelter from the storm

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Attractive prospect awaits

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Nikkin-bah, place of coal

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Passing on the culture

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From little things, big things grow

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New rhythms spring to life for Earth’s Jubilee

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Help create happier communities

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Perpetual Day of Remembrance

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Contact Aurora

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Next deadline 10 October, 2020

Muddy knees and climbing trees

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This edition of Aurora takes inspiration from the Season of Creation, which this year is themed “Jubilee of the Earth”. The photo on the front cover of Ruby Leddy, a student of St Therese’s Primary School, beautifully showcases the celebration of our natural environment. I thank her, and parishioners and environmental advocates Lawrie Hallinan and John Hayes, as well as Fr Kevin Corrigan, who answered my call for guidance in compiling this edition.

First word My word Care talk

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Alumni

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Food talk

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Growing up, my home was surrounded by beautiful gardens. My father, a farmerturned-horticulturalist who at one point studied to become a priest, has always marvelled in Earth's natural beauty. Some of my fondest memories with dad are pottering around in the garden designing beautiful spaces that included many native plants with hopes of attracting fauna. For the most part, our efforts were rewarded. These days my backyard is a lot smaller, as are many, and so I am delighted to learn that many schools have garden projects allowing students to feel that connection to the Earth. In the pages that follow you can read about a handful of these projects.

My paternal grandmother also nurtured my love for gardening and would often inspire me to observe what I saw and turn it into a song; butterflies were a regular feature. On reflection, I think this was her subtle way of encouraging me to observe and communicate how grateful I am for God's magnificent creation. It is

also a song, from my primary school choir days, that provides my first recollection of environmental messaging. We sang Big Yellow Taxi, which includes the lyrics “Don't it always seem to go, that you don't know what you've got ‘til it’s gone. They paved paradise and put up a parking lot."

I hope in reading this edition you might become more aware of some ways you can better appreciate what we, as citizens of the Earth, have. I'd prefer not to say "before it's gone" because I am hopeful that that won't be the case. In recent years the global community has become more aware of what we need to do to protect our Earth and live with it in harmony.

As Róisín's godmother, Fr Peter asked me to love like Jesus and guide her faith. Jesus wants us to care for our Earth like we do our mother, brother, sister and father, to cherish it, protect it and spend time with it. Over the years to come, I look forward to sharing my love of creation with Róisín.

Lizzie Snedden is Editor for Aurora

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FIRST WORD

Fostering a shared love for our Earth

St Therese Primary School, New Lambton student Ruby Leddy celebrating the beauty of Glenrock State Conservation Area.

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Aurora online Good news! You can still catch up with Aurora online, via www.MNnews.today.

Subscribe E aurora@mn.catholic.org.au Editor: Lizzie Snedden Graphic Design: David Stedman Contributor: Darrell Croker and Todd Dagwell Aurora appears in The Newcastle Herald on the first Saturday of the month, in the Maitland Mercury and in the Manning River Times the following Week. Aurora can also be picked up at IGA’s in Taree, Bulahdelah, New Lambton, Paterson, Karuah, Cameron Park, Wangi, Gloucester, Dungog, Shoal Bay, Boolaroo, Blackalls Park, Woodrising, Stockton, Caves Beach, Rathmines, West Wallsend and Windale. The magazine can also be read at www.mnnews.today

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MY WORD

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The heavens proclaim...

For a long time in this country there was pretty much a Catholic everything.

Catholic bookshops, multiple literary and debating societies, the Catholic Lawn Tennis Association, the Catholic Historical Society, Catholic Boy Scouts and Girl Guides, Newman Societies for uni students and a host of other sporting and cultural bodies provided outlets for the energies and interests of the Catholic community. Whether this was a good thing or not, these organisations at least broadened the horizons and fed the curiosity of young working-class Catholics who might otherwise not have had an easy entree into such activities.

The Catholic Bushwalking Club (CBC), founded in 1943, survives to this day in a moderately flourishing condition. I confess I have never been a member, but its influence on me has been considerable because some of the young priests who took me and my friends into the bush when we were teenagers had gained their knowledge in the CBC or in company with members. My friends and I then spent much of our youth and young adulthood deep in the bush of the mountains of NSW and Tasmania. In my case, that ran on into taking young people from my parishes into the bush for about the next 30 years. It gave us all something of value.

I mention all this in the context of Pope Francis’s great letter on environmental concerns, Laudato si’, in which he proposes the need for a cultural and spiritual shift in the way we relate to the natural world, “our common home”.

Whereas much writing about climate

change and care for the Earth centres on fear of future catastrophe, the Pope really is trying to move us to a new culture of love of the natural world in its own right. It is, after all, God’s creation and God’s gift, and we are part of it. He invokes St Francis of Assisi’s great hymn of praise for all Creation. The sun and the moon, the fields and streams, life itself, and even death, are brothers and sisters to us in Francis’s great canticle.

That is the connectedness that Pope Francis would have us feel for the Earth and its creatures, including of course our fellow human beings. He sees insensitive exploitation of the Earth’s resources as a kind of sacrilege, a failure to respect God’s gifts and our fellow creatures. The symptoms of this sacrilege are evident in the sheer waste that contemporary use of resources involves, in the destruction of whole ecosystems, and in the vastly unequal distribution of resources between rich and poor communities. To “care for our common home” means, in the first place, to co-operate together as a human family, to see how the violence we do to the planet is also violence visited on the poor.

There are many perspectives on Catholic environmentalism in this edition of Aurora.

So, I have felt a certain permission to come at the matter from my personal point of view. That was what all that stuff about bushwalking was. The Pope says, rightly, that we need to learn to love the natural world, and in my experience there’s nothing quite like walking through it, sitting amidst it, sleeping on it, listening to its sounds, learning its moods, feeling

its power and scale, gazing at its stars, and so on, to create that love, that sense of “home”, that connection. That’s my story, anyway.

We love, very often, what we have learnt to know and love. We care for what we love. And, of course, God’s glory is seen in God’s works.

As so often, there’s a Leunig cartoon that gently brings home the message. I have it on my mantelpiece. It shows us a man sitting in a room. Through the window, we see a beautiful sunset. But the man is slumped in his chair, watching the same beautiful sunset on his television. I think all of us who are parents or teachers or have any role with our children and young people, should do our level best to see that they don’t grow up to be that man.

Bishop Bill Wright Diocese of Maitland-Newcastle

Frankly Spoken "Living our vocation to be protectors of God’s handiwork is essential to a life of virtue; it is not an optional or a secondary aspect of our Christian experience.”

Pope Francis, Letter for the Establishment of the World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation, 2015.

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Photo: Peter Stoop

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Catholic Diocese of Maitland-Newcastle’s Head of Property, Ray Bowen with Chief Executive Officer, Sean Scanlon at San Clemente High School, Mayfield.

Caring for our common home SEAN SCANLON

It often seems that the Catholic Church is on the sidelines when it comes to contemporary issues - be it climate change, domestic violence, anti-slavery laws or discrimination. However, it is usually the case that the Church seeks to consider the issues and the broader societal impact before jumping to an answer. The Church applies a different lens to the circumstances - a Christ centred perspective - rather than a purely political or even economic view.

It attempts to ensure that the voices on the edge are heard and considered and sometimes those voices are those of future generations.

A case in point might be Laudato si’ which gives the simple message of the need to ‘care for our common home’. We all share this planet and we have no other place we can call home. The gift, though, comes with the responsibility of ensuring its survival for our children.

Across the Diocese we have been undertaking numerous significant developments in the form of new schools and St Nicholas early education centres.

There has been a particular focus on ensuring that these developments not only embody sustainable design but also

encourage the users to be mindful of the environment in which they live. The Diocese is adding to these efforts with a new appointment specifically tasked with ensuring that we achieve greater sustainability in everything we do.

with the natural environment. St Nick’s Centres enable their students to play with mud, dig in the dirt, handle trees and plants, and in so doing grow their understanding of and about the natural world.

The recently built hall at San Clemente High School, Mayfield, has incorporated laminated timber beams rather than the traditional steel ones which in the past may have come from the former BHP steelworks the school overlooks.

Laminated timber is an attractive material but also stores carbon.

On a recent visit to St James Primary School Kotara, it was great to see that Principal Lucy Harvey and the school had made the most of the natural spaces around the school and this was the favourite place for children to explore.

Similarly, the recently developed St Nicholas Early Education Centre at Branxton makes extensive use of solar panels to reduce the need for electricity from other sources.

Whilst the use of interesting materials or methods in construction is noteworthy, I think the important message of Pope Francis is in relation to the home we leave for our children and that is where the Diocese is playing a most significant role.

At St Nicholas we are very much aware that children learn through play.

Accordingly there is a focus on the type of play space that encourages engagement

At Medowie as the new Catherine McAuley Catholic College and St Nicholas Early Education Centre rise from the ground many sustainable features are being incorporated. The school will be ensuring that it achieves a green star level of development. The site itself will be an opportunity to leave a lasting legacy as the surrounding natural environment begins to be incorporated into the learning opportunities.

There is much more that the Diocese can do and is, indeed, working hard to ensure that we honour Laudato si’. For some this will be seen to be less than the swift action that Pope Francis calls for. For others, there is the real concern that if a parent works in the local coal industry there

could be an economic price to pay for the policies their school is promoting.

As we come out of a time of forced slow down, we are provided with an opportunity to think about the many messages in Laudato si’; our interaction with nature is of particular concern as we see the covid virus jump from animals to humans with devastating consequences. We might also reflect on meaningless consumerism and consider there is much we can do without.

The forced slowdown may be our chance to consider a more optimistic, sustainable future for the children we are nurturing today.

There is much more that the Diocese can do and is, indeed, working hard to ensure that we honour Laudato si’.

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Let’s be frank KEVIN CORRIGAN

Cardinal Bergoglio arrived in Rome in early March 2013 with all the other cardinals to engage in a process of prayer and discussions and then vote to select the new pope to lead the Catholic Church.

Much to the surprise of many, on 13 March 2013, the election of Argentinian Cardinal Bergoglio was announced. One of the first things a newly elected pope does is choose the name by which he will be known. The choice of the name is an indication of the kind of leadership direction the new pope will take.

For the first time in 800 years, the name “Pope Francis” was announced – in honour of the remarkable Francis of Assisi. This 13th-century saint lived a life of voluntary poverty, trusting in God’s providence.

He was also known for his joyfulness and appreciation of the way in which the beauty of nature speaks of the wonder of God. Francis would express this sense of closeness by referring to his “brother” sun; or “sister” moon; or “brother” wolf; as he approached his death, he referred to his “sister” death.

Soon after his election, Pope Francis announced he would like to see the emergence of “a poor Church in service of the poor”. He would soon release his first teaching and he would call this “The Joy of the Gospel”.

Then, in June 2015, Pope Francis released his major teaching on care for the global environment, Laudato si’, which means “praise to you”. The quotation is from the medieval saint’s hymn, “Praise to you, my Lord, through our sister, mother earth, who sustains and governs us.”

Laudato si’ is not pious nonsense. It is a visionary document that argues strongly for the necessity of systematic transformation of industrial practices, business objectives and personal lifestyles.

Tokenistic adjustments have no place in the Laudato si’ plan of action. On page one it says: “Saint Francis reminds us that our common home is like a sister with whom we share our life and a beautiful mother who opens her arms to embrace us ... This sister now cries out to us because of the harm we have inflicted on her by our irresponsible use and abuse of the goods with which God has endowed her ...”

Laudato si’ analysis of the human activities and attitudes that contribute to this environmental destruction makes for uncomfortable reading. It points to the essential need for a global “ecological conversion” and to a hope-filled vision for the establishment of a global “integral ecology”. This will reverse the cycle of

environmental degradation and help “restore a sense of sacred respect for the earth because it is not just our home, but also God's home” (Pope Francis, Earth Day, 2020).

The document makes clear that the necessary “global conversion” will only be achieved by nations, industries and economies working in solidarity. An integral component of this solidarity is to make real “the preferential option for the poor”.

“Rebuild my Church” was the mission that guided St Francis and “Restore my Planet” would be an apt mission statement Laudato si’. Globally, many understand the urgency for action, particularly the poor.

This year, Pope Francis launched a Laudato si’ anniversary year (24 May 2020 – 24 May 2021). A seven-year Action Platform will commence next year. The action platform will engage with seven areas of human activity to which Laudato si’ refers. Attention to these will contribute to the emergence of the global “integral ecology”.

These are the seven Action Platform areas.

1. Response to the Cry of the Earth – the emergence of sustainable business and industrial practices that also protect biodiversity.

2. Response to the Cry of the Poor – defence of human life from conception, and towards all vulnerable groups (indigenous, migrants and slaves).

3. Ecological Economics – sustainable and ethical production and consumption as well as investment in renewable energy.

4. Simpler Lifestyles – diet, energy use, forms of transport and sustainability.

5. Ecological Education – promoting awareness and action.

6. Ecological Spirituality – develops the religious sense of God’s creation through ecological catechesis, prayer and formation.

7. Emphasis on Community Participation and Action.

The Laudato si’ m will engage the global Church on the level of families; dioceses and parishes; schools; universities; hospitals and health centres; businesses/ agriculture and farms; and religious orders.

It will appeal to all people of goodwill and complement the UN Sustainability Goals.

Fr Kevin Corrigan is a priest in the Morisset Parish.

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School sews stewardship seeds LIZZIE SNEDDEN

The expanding school is considered a leader when it comes to implementing environmental initiatives, which actively encourage students to be stewards of the Earth.

Each year, students at the school plant nearly 1,000 trees along the nearby creek bed; tend to a bush tucker garden; get their hands wet in the marine science room; embrace opportunities to reduce waste and learn about sustainable food preparation in hospitality classes and the adjoining café; observe the ecology of a dedicated frog garden; and, cultivate a growing number of native stingless beehives.

"I like to get students out of the classroom and down to the creek bed to get their hands dirty," Ms Piper said. "By encouraging our students to be hands-on learners they are not just hypothesising from a textbook, they get to see first-hand what a thriving ecosystem looks like and study its effects."

However, it is not just gains students make in their studies that Ms Piper uses to judge the success of the school’s' environmental programs.

"When students come down to the creek and help out by planting trees, clearing weeds and removing rubbish, they begin to realise that they're not helpless, that they can support our environment, every day," she said.

School Principal, Larry Keating, says providing students with cross-curriculum opportunities that promote care for the environment helps develop their social conscience.

Nicholas Ryan Cummings is in Year 10 at St Mary's and although he feels the burden of a deteriorating environment, he is buoyed by taking part in the school's Landcare program.

"We all have a responsibility to be socially aware and prepared to do our bit," Mr Keating said. To ensure this, the school actively encourages hands-on learning experiences.

"I feel good that I can help,” Nicholas said.

“I enjoy being outside and doing what I can.

I don't like how the environment is being destroyed, and this is one of the most direct ways that I can lend my support."

"We're empowering our students to be stewards of creation rather than simply talking about it and agreeing with it,” he said. “This experience is especially important for this generation of students, more so than any other generation. They have such a vital role to play in preserving our creative order and our environment in particular."

Nicholas's peer, Camryn Posner, is also in Year 10 and said exercising her green thumb at the school is hugely rewarding.

Katrina Piper is a science teacher at St Mary's and said that over the years she had noticed students becoming increasingly aware of what is going on in the world around them, mainly due to time spent online.

"Students are often hearing and reading discussions about climate change on social media, and they see the impact of devastating environmental events such as bushfires," Ms Piper said.

Over the past 10 years, with assistance from Landcare, her colleagues and students, Ms Piper has helped transform what was once a barren drain bordering the school property into a thriving ecosystem.

"I like helping to plant tiny saplings and then waiting for them to become huge, towering trees,” Camryn said. “I can't quite explain the feeling. It's just such a rush being able to do something so small, and witness its big impact."

Ms Piper said it is the reason kids are volunteering to come back, year after year, to help plant trees. “They feel a great sense of connectedness,” she said. “It's such an incredible gift to share with them."

Despite St Mary's already making significant gains in the local environment, its staff and students have no plans to rest on their laurels.

Photos: Lizzie Snedden

For students at St Mary's High School, Gateshead, celebrating the glory of creation is not limited to September.

"I see it as a moral imperative that we educate our students to understand what it means to care for the environment," Mr Keating said.

Students from St Mary’s High School, Gateshead can get involved with various environmental initiatives.

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The Rana Plaza building in Bangladesh collapsed on 24 April 2013 killing 1,134 workers who formed part of the supply chain for “fast fashion”. It was a heartbreaking reminder of the human cost of cheap labour satiating the demand for more clothes.

All too much, after a fashion DARRELL CROKER

But no lessons were learnt. Between 2013 and 2018, British fashion brand Burberry burnt or destroyed more than $153 million worth of unsold clothing, perfumes and accessories rather than sell those items at a discount.

Burberry opted against “devaluing” its brand – so much for its sustainable scarves – but other labels have multiple drops of new items each week, which encourages consumers to treat clothing as a perishable and easily disposable product.

Fashion is estimated to be a $3.5 trillion industry employing about 75 million people and its business model drives pollution to new levels. The fashion industry now accounts for 10 per cent of global pollution, second only to aviation as the world’s largest industrial polluter.

According to the Australian Style Institute, globally we are now consuming 80 billion new pieces of clothing every year — 400 per cent more than we were consuming just two decades ago. Australia is one of the biggest contributors to fashion pollution, second only to the US. We send 85 per cent of the textiles we buy to landfill every year, which equates to about 27kg of new textiles per person per annum.

Newcastle-based Clare Van Doorn, St Vincent de Paul Regional Director – North East, says, much fast fashion is of poor quality, doesn’t last well and is often made by underpaid workers in developing countries.

Photo: Peter Stoop

“Australians are becoming increasingly aware of the downside of low-cost fast fashion,” says Ms Van Doorn. “The environmental impact is huge. More than half-a-million tonnes of throwaway clothing and leather items go to landfill each year, with many synthetics taking 200 years to break down.”

To keep costs down, brands outsource different links of their supply chains to countries with little or no worker protection. Labour rights abuses associated with fast fashion are widespread, particularly against women.

St Vincent de Paul volunteers play a major role in the ‘sustainability’ movement by recycling, sorting and styling preloved treasures.

But sweatshops are not exclusive to low-wage countries. In 2014, the Textiles, Clothing and Footwear Union of Australia (TCFUA) reported many outworkers in this country were being paid below-award wages – often about $7 an hour and, in some cases, as little as $4. It was well below the then legal minimum of $17.49 an hour wage for a machinist. Many were working 12- hour

to 15-hour days, seven days a week to make ends meet, according to the TCFUA. Traditionally, designers created garments on a two-season-a-year basis – autumn/ winter and spring/summer. In contrast, fast fashion has 52 micro seasons a year. It creates a “buy now or miss out” culture.

Pope Francis’s encyclical Laudato si’ says: “Since the market tends to promote extreme consumerism in an effort to sell its products, people can easily get caught up in a whirlwind of needless buying and spending.”

The Rana Plaza building housed production for 29 major brands. The US Department of Labor has reported evidence of forced labour and child labour in the fashion industry not only in Bangladesh, but also in Argentina, Brazil, China, India, Indonesia, The Philippines, Turkey and Vietnam.

Big-name brands have been “outed” in child labour and forced-labour scandals.

In 2018, the Australian government introduced the Modern Slavery Act – legislation establishing a new supply chain reporting regime.

To counter fast fashion, consumers should engage in slower, more conscious consumption, and extend the use time of each garment through investment and care.

Thankfully it is starting to happen.

Vinnies shops across the MaitlandNewcastle Diocese provide high-quality pre-loved clothing and household goods and Ms Van Doorn says business is “booming”.

“It’s like a treasure hunt,” she says. “You never know what unexpected treats await. People are now seeking better quality items, many from prestige brands that are affordable, because they’ve been passed on to charity shops like Vinnies.

“Our volunteers play a major role in the ‘sustainability movement’ by recycling, sorting, styling and selling these preloved treasures,” says Ms Van Doorn.

“They love styling their shops to make items sell better.

“Pre-loved clothing, much of it classified as vintage or collectible, is a wonderful bargain and has the environmental benefit of reducing the volume of waste going to landfill,” Ms Van Doorn says.

And all funds generated from Vinnies sales are spent on helping local families and individuals struggling to pay high rents and buy food and other essentials.

To buy or not to buy? The fast decision on fashion is better as a down-to-Earth consideration.

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Photo: Peter Stoop

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OzHarvest makes several deliveries of rescued produce to CatholicCare Social Services each week, which the organisation then serves to the vulnerable in our community.

Waste not, want not LIZZIE SNEDDEN

Limp broccoli, bruised bananas, spoilt meat, or a half-eaten sandwich. Have you ever paused to consider how much food you waste? Data revealed in the federal government's National Baseline reports Australians waste, on average, an astonishing 298kg of food per year, per person.

Being in the “top rank” of countries around the world is often referred to in a positive light. But not in this instance. Our collective, wasteful traits position the land down under as the fourth-highest food waster, per capita, globally.

So, what of it? If we're paying for food, we have a right to consume, or dispose of the goods we purchase, right? To answer this question, it's best to consider the real cost of food production. The damage to our planet, for one. The UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has reported that if food waste were a country, it would be the third-biggest emitter of greenhouse gases after the US and China.

Yes, really. Use of water and energy in production; clearing of land for vegetation and livestock; transportation of goods; and, food rot in landfill releasing potent greenhouse gases all contribute to climate change ... emphasising the importance of discerning consumerism more than ever.

In Laudato si' Pope Francis invites us to consider the term "environment", pointing out that what we are really referring to is "a relationship existing between nature and the society which lives in it".

"Nature cannot be regarded as something separate from ourselves or as a mere setting in which we live,” he says. “We are part of Nature, included in it and thus in constant interaction with it. Recognising the reasons why a given area is polluted requires a study of the workings of society, its economy, its behaviour patterns, and the ways it grasps reality. Given the scale of change, it is no longer possible to find a specific, discrete answer for each part of the problem. It is essential to seek comprehensive solutions which consider the interactions within natural systems themselves and with social systems. We are faced not with two separate crises, one environmental and the other social, but rather with one complex crisis which is both social and environmental. Strategies for a solution demand an integrated approach to combating poverty, restoring dignity to the excluded, and at the same time protecting nature."

Unsurprisingly, Pope Francis raises some important truths. With so many people around the world dying of starvation, or severely malnourished, it's shameful to think almost one-third of all food produced goes to waste. So, while the poor go hungry, and in many cases are subjected to harsh labour, many of us privileged folk waste food, while having little to no consideration of the environmental consequences.

The good news is, we have it in our power to turn things around.

OzHarvest, one of our nation's leading

food rescue organisations, reports that if a quarter of the food currently lost or wasted is saved, it would be enough to feed the world's hungry. On its website, OzHarvest lists ways we can all take small and simple steps to reduce our waste at home, in our workplaces and schools.

In addition to encouraging all Australians to be more mindful of consumption, the organisation recently celebrated 10 years of rescuing food from donors across the Hunter, including restaurants, cafes, supermarkets and the like. During this time, OzHarvest in Newcastle has saved more than 3,000 tonnes of food from going to landfill, delivering it to charitable organisations such as the Catholic Diocese of Maitland-Newcastle to serve vulnerable people in our community.

Each week, the organisation's bright yellow van makes several deliveries of rescued produce to CatholicCare, where staff and volunteers use the ingredients to develop nutritious meals to nourish those who need them most. This includes the homeless, new migrants, people experiencing mental health issues and low-income earners.

Rob Dawson, who oversees the program, says the donations OzHarvest provides are integral to the unfunded program's operations.

"Due to the quantity and quality of food collected and donated by OzHarvest to CatholicCare, its deliveries often form the foundation ingredients for the meals we provide," Mr Dawson says.

"We're grateful for OzHarvest’s support as not only does it enable us to provide meals, but also an opportunity to reach out and offer other forms of pastoral support to those in our community who are often isolated and disadvantaged in some way."

It's projected that an additional two billion people will join the planet over the next three decades. Now is the time for us to educate ourselves and change our behaviours so we can create a more sustainable food culture; a culture that, as the Pope suggests, takes into consideration the inextricable links between our current environmental and social crises.

" Strategies for a solution demand an integrated approach to combating poverty, restoring dignity to the excluded, and at the same time protecting nature. "

Pope Francis

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Seventy-three-year-old Beatrice lives in a small rural village in Zimbabwe and, with assistance from Caritas, has learnt sustainable farming practices to help ease the effects of drought.

Caritas groundnuts alleviate food insecurity JESSICA STONE

In Laudato si’ Pope Francis describes the disproportionate impact of climate change on those who are most vulnerable, and calls for stewardship of the Earth.

In countries such as Zimbabwe, for example, the impacts of a changing climate are harshest for those who live off the land and have limited access to food and water.

Seventy-three-year-old Beatrice lives in a small village in rural Zimbabwe. She raises chickens and grows most of her own food, but for the past few years her village has endured persistent drought and erratic weather patterns that have drastically reduced harvest sizes and driven up local food prices.

Early 2019 was especially challenging.

The ongoing drought resulted in Beatrice’s maize crop failing. Nationally, last year’s harvest of maize was worse than ever – 40 per cent down on the previous five years.

According to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, this was due to the combined impacts of drought and Cyclone Idai in 2019. As a result, last year more than half the population of Zimbabwe – 7.7 million people – were facing food insecurity.

Beatrice was paying as much as $7 for a bucket of maize at the nearby markets, a steep price she could only afford by selling off her chickens, which pushed her further into food insecurity.

However, in July last year, Beatrice became part of the joint Caritas Australia and

Caritas Zimbabwe Integrated Community Development Program. She attended two training sessions in groundnut crop production and began to grow the crop herself, using seeds provided by Caritas Gweru.

This new crop means Beatrice has been able to improve her harvests and increase her food security, despite the ongoing drought.

Groundnuts are especially suitable for Zimbabwe and are gaining in popularity in rural areas. Not only are they an excellent source of protein, fats and vitamins, but also a natural nitrogen-fixing crop.

Most small-scale farmers in Zimbabwe grow the staple crop, maize, on poor soil and have limited access to nitrogen fertilisers to improve their soil quality.

Now that Beatrice has the skills and resources necessary for groundnut farming, she is able to diversify her crops and improve the health of her vegetable garden in the long-term. It enables her to live more sustainably, and be less reliant on market fluctuations in maize prices.

She is very proud of her successful groundnut harvest that also ensured she was able to plant on time this year.

“The groundnut seed has brought great joy to me, and I have already harvested 50kg of unshelled groundnuts,” says Beatrice.

“This means that I will be able to use some for peanut butter and still keep some for seed for the next farming season.”

In September 2019, Caritas also helped community members construct a borehole to ensure regular access to safe, clean water.

“Water was a big challenge in our village,” says Beatrice. “Before, we were all surviving on water from unprotected sources. Now unsafe and unclean water is no longer a problem.”

The increased security of a nearby safe water source also has a significant impact on Beatrice’s crops, as she is now better protected against water shortages in drought-prone Zimbabwe.

Beatrice also received materials and training for a Blair Latrine – a special design that is easy to build, prevents flies and reduces the spread of disease. A relative of Beatrice’s helped her make the bricks and dig the hole for the latrine, and now she has both a safe latrine, and a tippy tap — a simple design, based on a bucket that enables her to wash her hands.

These improvements in health and sanitation have been especially crucial as the COVID-19 pandemic sweeps across the world. Caritas Australia and Caritas Gweru have distributed soap, run hygiene awareness training sessions and helped the community build many tippy tap systems.

The Zimbabwe Integrated Community Development Program through Caritas Australia and Caritas Gweru works with the most vulnerable, marginalised

people in remote rural areas to increase food security, nutrition and incomes and to improve access to safe water and sanitation. More than 9,000 people have directly benefited and more than 2,600 have indirectly benefited from this particular program.

The federal government supports this initiative through the Australian NGO Cooperation Program (ANCP).

Jessica Stone is communications officer for Caritas Australia.

These improvements in health and sanitation have been especially crucial as the COVID-19 pandemic sweeps across the world.

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Photo: Peter Stoop

W W W. M N N E W S . T O D AY / A U R O R A

Jess Storey, at her home in Mayfield, says since moving into the Diocese’s affordable housing she has not needed to worry about rental affordability.

Shelter from the storm TODD DAGWELL

Jess Storey always planned to live on her own, but the cost of the private rental market left her needing a more affordable arrangement.

“I’ve always had a permanent, stable job in retail but I still couldn’t afford to live on my own,” said the 36-year-old. “I ended up renting a townhouse with another lady because the cost of rent is so high in the private market. I really had no choice but to share.”

Anglicare’s 2020 annual rental affordability snapshot was released in April and showed that even before coronavirus decimated the economy and sent unemployment soaring, it had become exceedingly difficult for those on minimum wage and government payments to find places to rent.

Each year, Anglicare tests private rental properties for their suitability and affordability for people on low incomes without placing them in rental stress. Of 2,887 properties listed for rent from the Central Coast, Hunter, Lake Macquarie/ Newcastle and Mid Coast regions, the snapshot found almost 70 per cent were unaffordable and inappropriate for households on the minimum wage.

Maitland-Newcastle St Vincent de Paul Society data for the past two financial years highlights the consequences of persistently unaffordable housing in this region.

Vinnies found almost 20 per cent of people it assisted spent at least 60 per cent of their income on accommodation; another 20 per cent were homeless or in temporary

accommodation; and 47 per cent of the people it helped needed assistance to buy food.

Fortunately, in recent years there has been an increased effort by not-for-profit organisations, utilising government funding programs, to provide more affordable housing options for low-income earners.

The Catholic Diocese of MaitlandNewcastle signed up to the federal and state government-backed national rental affordability scheme in 2014. The program enabled the Diocese to construct new affordable housing complexes at Mayfield, Booragul and Mount Hutton resulting in 65 units. Tenants receive a 20 per cent discount off the market rent and each complex currently has a 100 per cent occupancy rate.

Ms Storey has been a tenant of the Mayfield complex for 18 months and said life had become much easier since she moved in.

“I now pay the same amount for my own unit as I paid to share with someone else in the private market,” she said. “I never worry about the cost of rent anymore and it’s a really great place to live with a lovely community of people.”

Diocese of Maitland-Newcastle CEO Sean Scanlon said the prohibitive cost of housing had become an obvious problem in the community and it was important the Church did something substantial to respond to the issue.

“Housing is about protecting people’s dignity,” he said. “Secure and appropriate shelter allows people to live a life where they can go to work, their children can be safe, and they are integrated with society and not marginalised.

“The subsidised rent provided by the Diocese means people have more money to feed their children, pay for education, and address their health needs.”

St Vincent de Paul Housing CEO Brian Murnane said 60,000 applicants were currently on the waiting list for social housing in NSW, including families with young children.

“Demand is growing rapidly due to coronavirus,” he said. “As part of Vinnies’ arrangement with the NSW government, 500 social and affordable housing properties are being developed across 12 sites throughout the state.”

Two of those sites are in the Hunter, a 17-unit complex in Maitland unveiled last month, and a 94-unit complex at Cardiff still under construction.

Mr Murnane said affordable housing unit tenants receive a 25 per cent discount on market rent under this program.

“Often the people who keep a suburb and a community functioning, such as garbage collectors, council work crews, café and retail employees, can’t afford to live where they work and face huge daily commutes,” he said.

“This program keeps work and home closer together and makes an enormous difference to their quality of life.”

Despite these increases in social and affordable housing stock, the St Vincent de Paul Society National Council believes far more needs to be done. It has called on the federal government to establish a social housing fund of $10 billion to address what it claims is a chronic shortage of safe, affordable housing in Australia.

Speaking at the start of National Homelessness Week last month, Vinnies national CEO Toby O’Connor said a National Housing Strategy is needed to address the shortfall of more than 400,000 dwellings nationally.

As outlined in Laudato si', Pope Francis has long advocated for all nations to prioritise providing inexpensive and suitable housing for the world’s poorest people.

We continue to call on the Australian government to increase its support to allow more people, like Jess, access to affordable and suitable housing.

A U R O R A C AT H O L I C D I O C E S E O F M A I T L A N D - N E W C A S T L E

Photo: Peter Stoop

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Ruby and Jane Leddy taking in the beauty of Glenrock State Conservation Area.

Attractive prospect awaits LAWRIE HALLINAN

Many of us are now making the most of any opportunity to leave our home-based COVID-19 social isolation and enjoy fresh air, sunshine, and the sense of space outdoors.

This is an even more attractive prospect with the arrival of spring. The days are getting longer, the air getting warmer, and plants and animals are bringing forth new life. It’s a perfect time to appreciate the natural environment and our part in it.

Such a time of reflection is the purpose of the Season of Creation, which many Christian churches mark at this time of year.

We find the origins of the Season of Creation in the 1989 proclamation of Patriarch Demetrios I, which states 1 September as a day of prayer for the environment in the Orthodox churches.

In 2003, the Catholic Bishops of The Philippines suggested this period of prayer for creation extend until 4 October, the feast day of St Francis of Assisi (Patron Saint of Ecology). In 2007, the World Council of Churches endorsed 1 September to 4 October as the Season of Creation (originally called Time for Creation). In 2015, Pope Francis invited the Catholic Church to join in the Season of Creation.

This year is the fifth anniversary of Pope Francis's letter, Laudato si’, in which he called on the Catholic Church to engage in a seven-year effort to better respond to the cry of the Earth and the cry of the poor.

Hebrew scriptures speak of a Jubilee every 50th year (after seven times seven years)

as a time to rest and restore ecological, social, and economic justice (Lev. 25:10).

The Season of Creation is now an annual event offered to the 2.2 billion members of the major Orthodox, Catholic, Protestant, and Anglican churches. “Jubilee for the Earth” is the 2020 theme for Season of Creation.

The need for climate justice grows more urgent. The poorest communities across the world experience the greatest environmental destruction, and they are the ones contributing the least to climate change.

The Season of Creation invites individuals and communities to reflect and work for justice REFLECT

JUSTICE

f Enjoy an individual or community creation walk or pilgrimage.

f Plant a tree.

f Share a photo of the beauty of creation on your own social media site or on the Season of Creation site seasonofcreation.org

f Adopt a more sustainable lifestyle as an individual/family www. livingthechange.net f Organise or join in an environment clean-up.

f Engage with one of the Global Catholic Climate Movement prayers catholicclimatemovement.global/ liturgical-prayer-and-spiritualresources

f Encourage your local church community to become a place that practises and promotes harmony with creation

In Australia, severe droughts, extreme weather events and extended bushfire periods combined with our land-use patterns are reducing biodiversity and threatening the existence of more species.

f Organise an Ecumenical prayer service (why not hold it outside).

f Sign and promote the Catholic Climate Petition seasoncreation. wordpress.com

In 2018, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change stated that emissions must halve by 2030 and to net zero by 2050. Many businesses and households are moving quickly to more sustainable practices. The Australian government needs to ensure that the transition does not unfairly impact those least able to adapt, especially coal communities such as the Hunter region.

f Complete the six-module online Laudato si’ course sdgacademy. org/course/laudato-si-on-care-forour-common-home

The COVID-19 pandemic has shown us the interdependence of our economies, political structures, healthcare systems, food chains, energy, and transportation systems. The pandemic and the Season of Creation could also be the stimulus to turn our appreciation for creation into significant and meaningful action for climate justice.

Lawrie Hallinan is a Tighes Hill parishioner.

f Integrate the Season of Creation into regular Sunday Eucharist.

f Organise or join in a Bible or Laudato si’ study group. f Immerse yourself in the Sisters of Mercy video reflections on animal, land, forests, wilderness, and rivers vimeo.com/user63890827 f Challenge yourself with a Season of Creation webinar gccm.controlshift. app/events/season-of-creationwebinar-a-just-recovery-for-asiapacific-and-oceania

f Join an advocacy group, such as Australian Religious Response to Climate Change www.arrcc.org.au f Write to your local MP seeking more sustainable policies and for a just transition for coal communities.

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Care talk

Friends in need KELLY PAVAN CatholicCare’s registered psychologists address a new issue each month.

The advice provided is general in nature and does not replace ongoing support and advice from your health professional.

To talk to someone about counselling support, call CatholicCare P 4979 1172 or Lifeline 24/7 on P 131 114.

We do not need academic evidence to realise that COVID-19 isolation resulting from quarantine, community restrictions, and social distancing, is triggering mental health challenges.

Statistics on loneliness before COVID-19 were already concerning, particularly when we understand the way in which it intensifies physical and mental health vulnerabilities. A University of Swinburne study undertaken in 2018 in collaboration with the Australian Psychological Society (APS), highlighted just how many Australians experience loneliness and anxiety. Some of the results include: f one in four Australians feel lonely f many Australians – especially younger Australians – report anxiety about socialising f one in four Australians experience high levels of social interaction anxiety f one in two report sometimes feeling shy, while 11 per cent report they always feel shy f 30 per cent do not feel part of a group of friends

Do you have a question for us?

f lonely Australians have worse physical and mental health, and are more likely to be depressed.

Email your question to aurora@mn.catholic.org.au or write to Aurora-CareTalk PO Box 756 Newcastle 2300.

Humans are social animals, and feelings of loneliness arise when our innate need to belong to a group is unmet. This can signal a need to form a meaningful connection

with others. Research has found that loneliness is related more to the quality than the quantity of relationships; a lonely person feels their relationships are not meaningful, and that others misunderstand them.

Social relationships support good mental and physical health. These tips will help you maximise your connections with others, even during current times when the methods we use to connect are changeable. f Join in. Embrace opportunities to volunteer or participate. Connect with others with a shared purpose. f Say names. Using someone’s name demonstrates caring. Ask after their loved ones or pets, or follow up from a previous conversation topic such as their weekend away. This shows you have paid attention. f Listen. Ask questions and really listen to the answers, rather than waiting for your turn to talk. Your body language and facial expressions can signal that you are listening with warmth. It is possible to demonstrate listening this way whether you are in a Zoom video call or in person. f Accept change. People’s circumstances and priorities change over time, leading to shifts in relationship dynamics. It uses much less of your emotional energy to come from a place of understanding;

sometimes friends need to attend to other things in their lives, and might come and go, and that can be a reflection of what’s happening for them, rather than how much they do or do not value you. Rolling with change can lead to reconnecting with old friends as well as maintaining current relationships. f Tolerate discomfort. Feeling awkward in conversation does not mean you are doing a bad job. Anxiety may lead you to avoid social opportunities, but all great achievements lie outside your comfort zone. You’ve got to be in it to win it. f Embrace technology. There are many opportunities to connect with existing friends and to meet new people through technology such as online chat, video calls, virtual parties, and book clubs. Just make sure to research secure and credible sites.

Creating connections requires effort and even some courage, but the benefits to your immediate and long-term health and happiness will be worth it.

A U R O R A C AT H O L I C D I O C E S E O F M A I T L A N D - N E W C A S T L E

Photo: Lizzie Snedden

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Louise Campbell, pictured at Redhead bluff, says passing on information and values to the younger generation is important to keeping indigenous culture alive.

Nikkin-bah, place of coal JOHN MAYNARD

The area around Redhead bluff is called Kintirrabin and roughly translates as "the earth fire was here". Redhead is the site of a long extinct volcano. The eroded volcanic plug figures in an Awabakal story on the origin of coal.

The Awabakal are believed to be the only Aboriginal tribal group to discuss coal in their Dreaming stories. They appear to have been well aware of coal's combustibility and are thought to have used lumps of it in their campfires.

According to the missionary Reverend Lancelot Threlkeld, the name for the Lake Macquarie district was Nikkin-bah, or place of coal. The Awabakal legend describes what sounds like a volcanic eruption, centred on Redhead, where the ancient volcanic plug remains today.

The traditional story relates that a very long time ago, when the earth and sea were different from today, a great darkness fell on the land. This darkness, which seemed to come from a hole in a mountain, blocked out the sun, and the darkness was so deep and sudden that the people were very frightened. Even birds and insects fell silent. Messengers were sent in all directions, bringing all people together to decide how light could be brought back to the world.

The wise men of the tribes decided that the only way to bring the world back to normality was to cover up the darkness that was scattered deeply on the ground.

Men, women and children dug up rocks and sand and broke down foliage from

trees and bushes to cover up the thick darkness. People from miles around came together to stop the darkness breaking through the surface of the Earth.

The people feared that the ever-burning fires deep in the ground would release the darkness again. After the darkness was covered over, generations passed in which people walked on the ground, pressing the darkness and the flames together under the earth to become nikkin, or coal.

Now, whenever coal is burnt, the spirit of the ancient earth fire is again released.

John Maynard is a Worimi Aboriginal man from the Port Stephens region and Professor of Indigenous Education and Research at the University of Newcastle.

He compiled this research on behalf of the Lake Macquarie City Council and generously granted permission for its use on their Lake Macquarie History Online website, where it was originally published. Aurora has since obtained permission to share this research.

Passing on the culture In Laudato si’ Pope Francis highlights important values that he says are deeply rooted in indigenous peoples. These include a greater sense of responsibility, strong sense of community, a readiness to protect others, a spirit of creativity and a deep love for the land.

Gumbaynggir Elder, Louise Campbell, agrees with the Pope’s sentiment. She says passing on information and values to the younger generation is important to keeping indigenous culture alive.

“The Indigenous circle of community symbolises this,” she says. “It illustrates the whole-of-community support for the inner-circle generations (the children in the centre), and the things we value (land, ritual and ceremony, spirituality, and stories). The outer circle depicts warriors protecting the inner circle. Everyone takes up their circles and supports the process. Continuing the knowledge and why we are here is crucial,” she said.

In another section of Laudato si’ Pope Francis emphasises the importance of showing special care for indigenous communities and their cultural traditions. “… for them, land is not a commodity but a gift from God and their ancestors who rest there, a sacred space with which they need to interact if they are to maintain their identity and values.

When they remain on their land, they themselves care for it best,” he says.

Ms Campbell takes up the point. “The Earth is our Mother,” she says. “We look after her as she looks after us.

Our spirituality and connections are all intertwined, and this is part of our culture that identifies us.”

Passing down the Dreaming stories to the next Indigenous generation is a great honour and cultural pastime for Ms Campbell. She hopes, as does the Pope, that sharing them with the wider community will encourage people in positions of power to consider the pressure being placed on indigenous people to abandon their homelands and sacred sites for agricultural and mining projects, which are often undertaken without regard for the degradation of nature and culture.

Pope Francis emphasises the importance of showing special care for indigenous communities and their cultural traditions.

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Photo: Peter Stoop

W W W. M N N E W S . T O D AY / A U R O R A

Students from Our Lady of Lourdes Primary School, Tarro pictured with Pastoral Care worker, Karen Tucker, along the school’s Indigenous Trail.

From little things, big things grow BELINDA HUNTRISS

Hundreds of years ago, wetlands in the Hunter region abounded with flora and fauna. There were fish, water birds and lizards aplenty and the catchments also provided a habitat for a variety of mammals including possums, wallaroos, kangaroos, swamp wallabies, swamp rats, sugar gliders, squirrel gliders, bandicoots and the like. Mobs from various Nations often visited the area, including the Tarro swamp, to draw from the natural richness of resources.

And, although colonisation has impacted much of the way things were, nestled among the school grounds of Our Lady of Lourdes Primary School, Tarro, is a flourishing cultural space that brims with life.

Our school takes great pride in offering insights into Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander culture with our staff and students. Inspired by the Dreaming, and in line with our school's Aboriginal Education Policy, several years ago Our Lady of Lourdes devised a concept to create a cultural space that can be used as an outdoor classroom.

My colleagues Bryan Rowe and Karen Tucker enlisted support from local Elders and our Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander families, who provided invaluable cultural guidance to achieve this goal.

Together, they developed plans for an Indigenous Trail that at the suggestion of an Elder, included a Rainbow Serpent Path. Proudly, the concept has now been brought to fruition, assisted by a $10,000

grant from the City of Newcastle as part of its Local Schools Community Fund.

However, the trail is far more than just bricks and mortar.

In the months following the path’s construction, we invited Indigenous families from our school community to suggest plants that could be included alongside the path. The original intention was for them to attend a Family Planting Day so they could share the cultural and family significance of their plant with our school community. However, due to coronavirus restrictions, these plans did not eventuate.

Not deterred, our students took up the opportunity on behalf of their families to share the significance of the plant with their peers, before placing them in the garden. Now, they take great pride in tending to the plants, ensuring they grow to be healthy and strong. This practice builds upon their sense of Aboriginal identity, knowing their family has used a certain kind of plant for millennia.

Additionally, they are developing increased confidence as they learn the seasonal characteristics of the plant such as when it fruits, when to pick, and its various uses.

As the school's Aboriginal Education Teacher, I regularly invite all students to be involved in hands-on learning opportunities, particularly in the garden surrounding the trail. Our young learners are enthralled by the stories they hear, which often convey messages of Aboriginal people’s connection to and

respect for the land.

Plant identification, collection of natural resources for investigations and encouraging students to imagine life before colonisation are all commonplace when we gather outdoors. It also provides a great space to put to use the skills they learn in other subjects. Recently, students in Years 3 and 4 learnt about traditional Aboriginal housing and designed their own humpy. As part of the design process students were encouraged to consider what materials were available in the area, how long they intended to stay and the impact of the weather and seasons.

Next on the agenda, our students will use the trail to design and experiment with their own fish trap while learning about traditional Aboriginal fishing methods.

The trail also includes a substantial space to grow fruit and vegetables. Ms Tucker shares her passion for environmental sustainability with the students and does a marvellous job at showing them how to tend the soil and grow produce. The garden provides an ideal space for Ms Tucker to execute pastoral care, for which she received an Emmaus award in 2019, and the garden has become the focus for many of our neighbours as well.

While we have made significant progress on the Indigenous Trail since its inception a few short years ago, we have plans to expand, including the development of a Meeting Place at the end of the trail. The Meeting Place will be an area where the

bush meets the sea, signified by using sand to create a yarning circle and local coastal plants, such as pig face.

We are grateful for the regular gatherings of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander families at our school, who come together to discuss important issues and provide input regarding the future of our Aboriginal education and inform our school's personalised Aboriginal Education policy.

It is hoped the Meeting Place, when complete, will become an area in which our families and community members can gather and feel culturally safe, just as they would have all those years ago. It will also provide an ideal setting for our staff and students to continue to enhance their cultural understanding by sharing stories that convey the courage, resilience and survival of Aboriginal people and their respect for Dreaming.

Belinda Huntriss is a Worimi woman and Aboriginal Education teacher at Our Lady of Lourdes Primary School, Tarro.

ALUMNI

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A U R O R A C AT H O L I C D I O C E S E O F M A I T L A N D - N E W C A S T L E

Change is going to come BRITTANY GONZALEZ Alison Penfold is a former student of St Clare’s High School in Taree. After completing her HSC in 1989, she studied a Bachelor of Asian Studies, specialising in Korean language, at the Australian National University (ANU). While at ANU, her interest in politics led to opportunities to work as a staffer for several federal ministers including most recently as chief of staff to the Minister for Agriculture and Water Resources, David Littleproud. Before that, she worked on contentious public policy issues as chief executive of the Australian Livestock Exporters’ Council between 2012 and 2016. She is currently a director of specialist management consultancy, Futureye.

What Catholic school/s did you attend? Do you know why your parents chose Catholic education for you?

I was very fortunate to attend St Clare’s High School from Year 9 to Year 12. In 1985, my parents semi-retired and we moved from Sydney to our holiday home in Harrington. I had attended an all-girls Church of England school in Sydney since third grade and my parents were conscious of finding a similar high-quality and disciplined school environment for me.

They approached St Clare’s and thankfully I was accepted.

This edition of Aurora takes inspiration from the Season of Creation, which is celebrated in September. During the season we enter a time of restoration and hope, a Jubilee for our Earth. 2020 has been a year like no other. How has it influenced your perception on ways of living with creation?

2020 has certainly been a challenging year. I contracted COVID-19 in March and April and the experience reminded me of the fragility of our existence and how important it is to focus on the things that matter most. This has translated into investing more into becoming self-reliant and sustainable.

You have first-hand experience in community engagement, policy development and advocacy. What role do you think education plays in motivating change?

Education is a channel through which people are exposed to the world and all that comes with it. I think understanding just how large our universe is – physically and metaphorically – opens our minds to question our perception of the world we live in and the influences on our value sets.

This process can stimulate and motivate a desire for change where for example, we see injustice or unfairness.

I also see education from a skills perspective being important to motivating change. Education, certainly in my experience, creates a space for people to become inquisitive about the world around them. Being inquisitive leads to skills such as critical thinking and strategic foresight, which are important to resolving many of the wicked problems in our society.

This process too helps develop soft diplomacy skill, such as having the ability to question current practice or thinking in a way that is non-threatening to others.

Too often, change and the discussion of it, is seen in adversarial terms rather than as a reflection of maturing social values

and norms. If we can view change in the context of the latter, we can create a mental bridge to a dialogue that is less combative and more inclusive, collaborative and respectful of difference.

You are a director of Futureye, a management company with a focus on sustainability, social licence to operate, risk and communications.

In Laudato si’ Pope Francis focuses on the need to involve various stakeholders in discussions regarding important community matters.

“Environmental impact assessment should not come after the drawing up of a business proposition or the proposal of a particular policy, plan or programme,” the Pope says. “It should be part of the process from the beginning and be carried out in a way which is interdisciplinary, transparent and free of all economic or political pressure.” What are your thoughts on this?

I wholeheartedly agree. Too often engagement in the context of planning approvals is done as a tick the box exercise – a one-way form of communications that treats “having your say” as the end point of community involvement in a decision-making process.

We need genuine dialogue and co-design of assessment processes that provide genuine opportunity for people to engage, receive feedback and ultimately see how their input has influenced a policy or project design.

You have undertaken a few Catholic pilgrimage trails in Europe including the 800km Camino de Santiago in 2016 and then 300km of the Via Francigena from Besancon, France to Aosta, Italy in 2019. What inspired you to undertake these walks? And how did it influence your relationship with nature and/or your own spirituality?

There is something adventurous about packing all your needed belongings and hitting the road. It is romantic and exhilarating. I love walking, and the challenge of long distance had enthralled me for a long time so when the opportunity came after leaving a very stressful job in 2016 and then again in 2019, I did not need convincing. I loved every moment of each walk despite the blisters, the challenging terrain (more so on the Via Francigena), and the heat and exhaustion.

The people and places along the path are amazing. There is a great sense of camaraderie – you never passed another walking without a friendly “Buen Camino” and a solo walker could always find friendly company at the end of a day. I have never felt happier, more content with myself and clearer about my life’s purpose. Walking under wide open skies, often alone, I felt closer to the world and the nature around me than ever before. I can’t say it was a religious experience for me, but it was a spiritual one, freeing me to deal with some personal demons and find a space to just be without judgment. I can’t wait to get back on the trail many times over.

Snapshots of Alison Penfold undertaking Catholic pilgrimage trails in Europe.

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New rhythms spring to life for Earth’s Jubilee BERNADETTE GIBSON

What is a Jubilee? In the tradition of the Church, life has an age-old rhythm.

It begins with the story of creation and the rich theology of Sabbath found in the Book of Genesis. After all the work creating the world, “God rests” (Genesis 2:3). Well-known Catholic priest and writer Ronald Rolheiser describes this as the first sabbatical. Sabbath, he tells us, means seventh day.

Christians celebrate the Sabbath on Sunday, the first day of the week, because this coincides with the resurrection. A natural rhythm emerged from the scriptures. We work for six days, and have a one-day sabbatical, then work for six years and have a oneyear sabbatical. Then we work for seven times seven years and take a Jubilee year. This is meant to be a Sabbath for the whole Earth, a Sabbath for the planet.

Walking along a beach, Stepping into the expanse of a horizon, The cry of gulls on the wind.

Its vastness makes my smallness feel connected, And my heart becomes greater than my body.

These beaches, these sands, these breezes, These horizons are what my beloved is to me.

To paraphrase the scripture from Ecclesiastes there is a time for every season under heaven.

Bernadette Gibson reflects on the Season of Creation at Nobby’s Headland at sunrise.

Photo: Peter Stoop

The heaving movement of the waves,

COVID-19, whilst devastating in its arrival, also created significant wonder and hope for creation as the entire world ground to a halt. Coming so swiftly after the suffocating smoke-filled days of January and February, the droughtravished previous years, the immediacy of that first lockdown forced us to consider our self-absorption and failure to listen to the cries of the Earth. All of us are slaves to a tyranny of consumption, materialism, and convenient indifference.

It is to the detriment of the most vulnerable, notably the Earth herself.

This forced Sabbath reminds us that to engage in a celebration of rest and sustainability, is a commandment, not a lifestyle.

The Season of Creation, an ecumenical initiative, unfolds in September, echoing Pope Francis’s call in Laudato si’ for ecological conversion, proclaiming a mega Sabbath for the planet. It calls us to “remember the Sabbath” (Exodus 20:8) and then, to rise again – together.

We are asked to assess, “to sit with” the cost of living as we do. The practice of a Jubilee for the Earth is contemplative, active work. The challenge is not to return to our wasteful ways of living.

Already as we emerge from isolation,

we are forgetting the cost. This return to a false normalcy is reliant on market forces rather than working towards the common good. It is a way of life that has caused disease in its selfishness.

Participating in a Season of Creation refocuses all people of goodwill to reflect on the meaning of a Jubilee for the Earth. As we straddle the world we already know, and the hope of a postCOVID world, which is not yet, it is a call to arms for all to live a life characterised by moderation, simplicity, stewardship, and sustainability.

This September, join with Pope Francis; the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby; Patriarch Bartholomew from the Eastern Orthodox church; General Secretary of the Council of Churches, Olav Fykse Tveit; and Christians and people of goodwill across the world, to not only pray together, but to tackle the real relationships between poverty and the fragility of the planet. Let us embrace new ways of living where the economy does not sacrifice community or creation. Rising to an authentic personal ecological conversion is a social benefit for the common good of the most vulnerable, weak, and poor. A gift for future generations.

If there is movement towards wholeness of soul, then there is a movement towards wholeness of the universe.

“God, Earth and humanity are in a relationship.” When we are broken, so too are our relationships with the cosmos. When we are in communion, in deep love, we bless the world around us in hope.

Let’s take this time to reflect on the blue skies over Wuhan, the images of the Himalayas from afar, the clarity of the Milky Way and swans on Venetian canals, and wonder, is this a time for a new season of hope, for the regenerative rhythms to live?

Bernadette Gibson is Education Officer Religious Ed & Spirituality, Catholic Schools Office.

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A U R O R A C AT H O L I C D I O C E S E O F M A I T L A N D - N E W C A S T L E

Help create happier communities Child abuse and neglect is one of Australia’s most significant social problems.

The National Association for Prevention of Child Abuse and Neglect (NAPCAN) says tens of thousands of children are abused or neglected each year. Now, on the eve of Child Protection Week (6-12 September), it has amped-up its request for the community to help put a stop to it.

“Child abuse and neglect is preventable,” says NAPCAN CEO Richard Cooke. “If we all work together as a community, we can create an Australia where all children can grow up safe and well.”

This year is the 30th anniversary of NAPCAN leading a Child Protection Week campaign, and the theme is “Putting Children First”.

“Putting children first means prioritising their safety, welfare and wellbeing,” says Connie Peate, an investigator with the Catholic Diocese of Maitland-Newcastle’s child protection agency, the Office of Safeguarding.

The Catholic Diocese of Maitland- Newcastle is committed to the safeguarding of children. The Diocese has an abiding commitment to promote the safety, welfare, and wellbeing of children. The Office of Safeguarding (OoSG) is the structural expression of the Diocese’s commitment to demonstrate the highest standards of recognising and upholding the dignity and rights of all children.

what children have to say,” she says.

“Where possible, include their voices in decision making and be advocates for their best interest.”

The OoSG provides training to diocesan personnel to ensure they adopt safe work practices and increase awareness of child protection concerns. The OoSG also provides an intake service to assist diocesan personnel in ensuring they meet their mandatory reporting obligations as well as their duty-of-care obligations. Risk assessments and comprehensive compliance audits are also undertaken to ensure the Diocese is compliant with various safeguarding regulatory and contractual obligations and to reduce and manage identified risks.

How do we help create stronger, happier communities?

“If we speak regularly with children about their personal safety and ways in which they can protect themselves, and listen to their worries, they are more likely to trust us and feel comfortable talking with us when they feel concerned,” says Ms Peate.

“Check in and help your neighbours and friends, be a good role model, support and be kind to parents rather than judging or being competitive, and speak up if you see something that is unsafe.”

Kindergarten to year 2

Year 3 to year 6

padlet.com/OfficeofSafeguarding/K_2

padlet.com/officeofsafeguardingmn/years3_6

Ms Peate is a passionate advocate for the prevention of child abuse and neglect. She meets regularly with diocesan stakeholders including social services and teaching staff, and parents and leaders, to promote and implement child protection policies.

“To thrive, children need to be loved, feel safe, and have access to the essentials such as food, shelter, medical and mental health support,” she says.

Ms Peate acknowledges the COVID-19 pandemic has placed added strain on families and communities. As a result of pandemic-related pressures, and the increased presence of children and young people online, she cautions that now, more than ever, we all need to play our part in protecting children.

“It is important that we listen to, and value,

High School

Parents

padlet.com/Office_of_Safeguarding/high_school

padlet.com/officeofsafeguardingmn/parents

In a Church organisation, it is good to remember Jesus was a baby, an infant, a child, and a teenager.

In children we see the face of God.

W W W. M N N E W S . T O D AY / A U R O R A

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Perpetual Day of Remembrance LOUISE GANNON RSJ AND MAUREEN O’HEARN

The Diocese of Maitland-Newcastle marks the Perpetual Day of Remembrance on 15 September. This day came about following the launch of Lina’s Project in 2017, a survivor-led event the Diocese facilitated, which can still be viewed on YouTube. The purpose of Lina’s Project was to publicly acknowledge the devastation caused to victims and survivors of child sexual abuse by clergy and other Church personnel, as well as the damage done to their families, friends, and the whole community. It was also an opportunity to admit with shame and to beg forgiveness for the Church’s cover-ups and failures to report allegations of child sexual abuse.

As such, the Perpetual Day of Remembrance holds before us our history of child sexual abuse and the reality of its ongoing impact on the lives of those directly and indirectly affected. The day is acknowledged in two ways. One is for the Church community to remember this history and respond with a range of opportunities for prayer, ritual and worship that seek to respect the diversity of the Catholic community.

Growing this Church response is critically

important and challenging, and we are committed to developing our response from year to year as we listen and reflect on our experience. For the community of faith, prayerful remembering is about shining the light of Christ on our experience, particularly our brokenness, in order that we will see with the eyes of Christ and be changed, individually and as a community.

To mark the Perpetual Day of Remembrance with Sunday Mass is the most meaningful way for the Church to respond. This year, to add to this significance, Bishop Bill has issued a decree declaring “Perpetual Day of Remembrance Sunday” a feast inscribed on the diocesan liturgical calendar. Each year it will be celebrated on the Sunday of or before 15 September and will have its own readings and prayers.

While Mass is one way we can pray, it is not the only way. And so, as we did last year, there will be a range of additional resources provided for schools, diocesan agencies and other groups, and for individuals and households. Hopefully, everyone will find something that will

enable them to stand with survivors and their families and friends and show their commitment to shine the light of Christ on this issue. To quote a line from the prayer for turning on the lights: “Where there is dishonesty and denial may we shine the light of your (Christ’s) truth.”

The second form of acknowledgement is for the Diocese to facilitate or support a survivor-led event. Unfortunately, this year there can be no “event” as such due to COVID-19 and the subsequent restrictions on gatherings. However, the day is too important to be overlooked. It is a day to stop and reflect on the ongoing pain experienced by those affected by abuse as well as taking time to remember those who are no longer with us because of that pain.

Bishop Bill has written to survivors noting that people might like to acknowledge the day in a variety of ways. If you want to reflect on the meaning of the day you might do that in a way that is meaningful to you, be that listening to a piece of music, visiting a significant place, or simply being still with your own thoughts.

an opportunity to share with people information about the Bishop’s Healing Fund. This is an annual allocation by the Bishop of Maitland-Newcastle of up to $25,000 to assist in promoting the healing of those affected by child sexual abuse in the Diocese. The Healing Fund’s target groups are those affected by child sexual abuse perpetrated by Church personnel in this Diocese and those residing in this Diocese who have been affected by child sexual abuse perpetrated by a member of a religious order or another Diocese.

This is an opportunity for survivors and family members to create and suggest activities, events or projects to promote healing or wellness among those affected by abuse. For more information about the Bishop’s Healing Fund please go to officeofsafeguarding.org.au/bishopshealing-fund or phone 4923 0636.

Maureen O’Hearn is the Manager of Healing & Support (Zimmerman Service) and Louise Gannon RSJ is the Manager Worship and Prayer in Diocese of MaitlandNewcastle.

This year, the day is also providing

The Bishop’s Healing Fund is an annual allocation of funds, up to $25,000, to assist in promoting the healing of those affected by child sexual abuse in the Catholic Diocese of Maitland-Newcastle.

Bishop’s Healing Fund

Survivors, close relatives or supporters of individuals affected by abuse can apply for funding to support a range of group healing activities.

For more information, including the criteria and application form, go to officeofsafeguarding.org.au/bishops-healing-fund or phone Healing and Support (Zimmerman Service) 4923 0636.

A U R O R A C AT H O L I C D I O C E S E O F M A I T L A N D - N E W C A S T L E

Photo: Jessica Ward

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St Nicholas Early Education centres are designed to encourage children’s sense of wonder.

Muddy knees and climbing trees KERRI ARMSTRONG

Reggio Emilia-informed contemporary theories and research hold the environment as the “third teacher” behind families and educators.

This approach recognises that providing inclusive, engaging and sustainable learning environments holds the potential to support young children’s learning. This approach was developed after World War II by pedagogist Loris Malaguzzi and parents in the villages around Reggio Emilia, Italy.

The Australian Children’s Education & Care Quality Authority (ACECQA) says the physical environment should never simply be a backdrop to the curriculum in early childhood education and care services, but an integral part of the curriculum.

That is why, when setting up new services, it is important for providers to consider the way in which every aspect of the

design will influence a child’s learning and development.

We must consider that rich environments with built-in learning opportunities free educators to interact with children. This ultimately supports the child’s sense of belonging and affords educators the time to better understand the children and program to their unique interests and strengths.

But what do these environments actually look, feel and smell like?

At St Nicholas Early Education, we set up all our learning environments with the consideration that each space, whether indoor or outdoor, must be engaging, empowering and respectful, inclusive and accessible, and encourage collaboration and investigation.

In St Nicholas' outdoor environments, large

sandpits, bicycle tracks, tepees, fountains, mud kitchens and plenty of natural elements are just some examples of features incorporated to support children’s learning and development.

The inclusion of natural environments in early childhood settings is also important because they support children to develop stewardship in order to become environmentally respectful and responsible.

But what do all of these things have in common? Well, they are all open-ended, meaning there are no instructions the children must follow when they engage with them. Instead, they follow their innate curiosities to partake in ways that are meaningful to them.

Elements such as garden beds, worm farms and recycling stations are just some of the ways our educators are working with children every day to encourage a shared responsibility of our community and its environments.

When children are immersed in play, even if it is muddy or messy, we do our best to allow them to follow that experience right through to the end in their own unique way.

This promotes each child’s sense of agency and wonder – a crucial component of their early personal and emotional development.

It is of the utmost importance that we work with our youngest to take care of the environment, especially since they are the ones who will inherit this Earth after we are gone.

Kerri Armstrong is the General Operations Manager of St Nicholas Early Education.

Community noticeboard For more events please visit mn.catholic.org.au Live stream Mass every Sunday at 9.30am at www.mn.catholic.org.au/places/live-stream/

thousands of Australians to sign the pledge for the #EndCOVIDForAll campaign.

#EndCOVIDForAll Caritas campaign

Show your support for vulnerable communities around the world and sign the pledge at https:// mncso.news/EndCovidForAll

The COVID crisis is not going to end for anyone until it ends for everyone. Show support for our neighbours around the world, many who are ill-equipped to deal with a pandemic. The worst impact of COVID-19 is experienced by communities already facing poor sanitation, overcrowding and limited access to healthcare.

Overcrowding makes social distancing almost impossible, and puts vulnerable family and community members at risk. The lack of running water, soap and face masks means communities cannot contain the spread of the virus. During widespread lockdowns, vulnerable families also struggle to put food on the table. Many households are losing all income, which pushes those who were already living at the margins further into poverty and hunger.

Caritas Australia has banded together with a group of churches, international aid agencies and

Sharing your story Everyone has a story.

No matter how ordinary yours may seem, we all have a story to tell, and you never know what it can mean to someone until you share it. As we enter a fallow period, we have been given the gift of time. A time to reflect on our life, a life of being faithful people.

We invite you to share your story. You can use the following questions as a guide. Who are the people who guided your faith journey? How did they do that? Describe some defining moments of your faith journey? What made them significant?

How has your faith been reflected in your work, your hobbies, your values, your choices, and your priorities at various times in your life? In what

ways has your faith guided and supported you over your lifetime? How has your church/faith community guided and supported you?

We hope to use these stories as part of a Diocesan Formation and Education project.

Please send your story to: shareourstory@ mn.catholic.org.au Seasons of Creation – 1 September to 4 October To celebrate the Season of Creation, Catholic Earthcare is hosting an online Convocation.

Exploring Laudato si’, the ethics, moral and financial imperative to care for our common home, and with international leading experts in finance, theology and conversation, this series is not to be missed.

Due to COVID-19, this conference will be delivered online. You can register your interest at www.mncso.news/SeasonsOfCreation For more events please visit mn.catholic.org.au.

For your diary September 5

International Day of Charity

6

Father’s Day

10 World Suicide Prevention Day 12 R U OK? Day 21 International Day of Peace 27 World Day of Migrants and Refugees

W W W. M N N E W S . T O D AY / A U R O R A

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Students at St Joseph’s High School, Aberdeen are encouraged to develop an understanding of the interactive nature of the land.

Food talk Looking out the window of the kitchen at St Joseph’s High School, Aberdeen, is a sight to behold.

The school is situated on picturesque grounds with extensive views of green fields, rich farmlands, cattle grazing, the Hunter River and distant mountains. It’s a uniquely beautiful backdrop providing an ideal opportunity for students to appreciate the environment as they their master Food Technology studies.

The school’s 60-hectare farm, Olive Grove, which is a 20-minute drive, provides students with an opportunity to immerse themselves in the production of food, following their products from paddock to plate. School Principal, Robert Holstein, says this experience allows students to develop an understanding of the interactive

nature of the land, “and to then build a respect for all living and non-living things”.

The school’s hospitality teacher, Kristy Roach, says the responsible production and consumption of food is a core focus of her lessons, some of which concentrate on food preservation techniques; using seasonal produce (preferably homegrown); substitute ingredients; and, the various applications of "food waste", such as bones and vegetable off-cuts to make broth.

“We share this with the students so they can see how their footprint impacts upon the world they live in and are heading out into on their own in a few years,” she says.

Ms Roach says that this educational approach inspires students to have a greater awareness of the environment,

as well as enabling them to consider the financial and nutritional benefits of mindful consumerism.

“We always want our students to be thinking about how they can use natural produce to reduce the cost on their budgets, especially if heading off to university or other study, where income may be restricted but nutrition is still highly important,” she says.

“We have a huge emphasis on nutritional benefits of fresh fruits and vegetables, especially their skin, and look at the nutritional loss of preparation and various cooking methods. We also look at the importance of nutrition in the soil and the impact on the environment if variation production practices were reduced or stopped.”

Students respond well to the lessons, particularly ones that include use of native ingredients they may not have come across at home.

“As acknowledgment to our history we often cook with native ingredients that Aborigines have been using for generations,” Ms Roach says. “It’s been such a success that soon we will be introducing a new garden and yarning circle that will allow us greater access to native ingredients.”

Kangaroo stir fry In line with Stage 4 Curriculum for Food Technology, students helped develop our kangaroo stir fry recipe, which includes Aboriginal and Asian influences.

Aboriginal people have eaten kangaroo for thousands of years. It is a healthy source of red meat, but it is so lean it can easily become dry and tough if overcooked, or chewy if it is undercooked. For best results, kangaroo should be cooked quickly and using high heat, as this will keep the meat tender and prevent it from drying out. It is best served rare to medium rare, except for mince and sausages.

INGREDIENTS

METHOD

1 kangaroo steak, thinly sliced

1.

Complete all mise en place (preparation before cooking – cutting vegetables and meat, making the relish if not using a pre-made mix, boiling water for noodles and so on).

2.

Whisk egg and cook thinly like an omelette. Remove from pan and shred thinly.

3.

Add noodles to boiling water, as per instructions on the packet.

4.

Heat oil in pan using medium heat, before adding garlic, onion and chillies. Stir regularly, sautéing until they become lightly golden.

5.

Turn up the heat to high before adding kangaroo to the pan. Cook till lightly browned on the outside.

6.

Add into pan carrots, corn, celery, egg, cabbage and spinach or warrigal greens. Gently sauté, allowing some crunch on the vegetables to remain.

7.

Stir through the relish, chopped parsley and noodles until all are lightly covered. Season with salt and pepper.

8.

Serve on a plate with a sprig of parsley to garnish.

1 tablespoon oil ½ diced onion 1 tsp garlic or 1 clove 1-2 cups shredded red cabbage 1-2 red chillies, thinly sliced 2 cups baby spinach or warrigal greens 1 carrot thinly cut into sticks (julienne) ½ cup corn kernels 1 egg 1 celery stalk ¼ cup crushed macadamia (optional) ½ cup bush tomato relish (or, a pepper berry sauce if preferred) 1 packet rice noodles

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A U R O R A C AT H O L I C D I O C E S E O F M A I T L A N D - N E W C A S T L E

Photo: Lizzie Snedden

Book talk

Students at St James’ Primary School, Muswellbrook recommend The Lorax to other children and favour the important messages it sends about respecting nature.

The Lorax by Dr Seuss YEAR 5/6, ST JAMES’ PRIMARY SCHOOL, MUSWELLBROOK

A few pages into the The Lorax the colourful illustrations transport you into a fictional world filled with “Truffula Trees” that provide shade for the “Brown bar-baloots” that play underneath, and where “Swomee-Swans” sing and “Humming Fish” hum.

However, all that changes when one greedy character, the “Once-ler”, arrives.

After strolling into town, it doesn’t take long for the Once-ler to create a “Thneed”.

“Everybody needs a Thneed,” he says.

Creating a Thneed requires him to cut down a Truffula Tree. (A Thneed, in case you’re wondering, is described by the Once-ler as “A Fine Something That All People Need. It’s a shirt. It’s a sock. It’s a glove. It’s a hat … but is has other uses.

Yes, far beyond that …”).

As he chops his first tree down to make a Thneed, the Lorax appears and tells him to stop. But what does the Once-ler choose to do? He ignores this advice, believing he is doing no harm. Filled with great greed, his business grows and grows, and one by one the trees come down. As the Truffula Trees disappear so too does their colour, and the township begins to transcend into darkness.

grinds to a halt; and so too does the town.

No longer do the Swomee-Swans sing, the Humming Fish hum or the Brown-barba-loots play. With all signs of life having disappeared, the Lorax leaves the Onceler alone in the dark. The Lorax’s final parting word is written on a pile of rocks “… UNLESS”. The reader is then invited to follow the Once-ler’s journey to discover what is meant by this parting message.

As wagons leave the factory filled with Thneeds, the Lorax once again appears and begins to send each creature off, one by one, explaining it is no longer a place they should be. The Lorax warns the Once-ler again, but he still won’t listen and fuelled by greed continues to cut down trees.

Dr Seuss wrote The Lorax in 1971. He was an outstanding author who wrote stories using his imagination. The Lorax helps kids understand the importance of stewardship of creation.

Then, after the final tree comes down with a thud, the factory the Once-ler created

Creation is a gift from God, and it is our responsibility to look after this gift. We are not only looking after creation for ourselves but for all people and animals around the world. The Lorax shows that we do not

need to continually have more and more things. We need to make small changes in our daily lives to look after creation. It reminds us that it is important to be more, rather than having more.

We think children would enjoy this book because of the nonsense language and rhyme that engages the audience into a world of silliness and humour, while delivering a powerful message. It encourages children to become involved in a conversation about the environment and look for different ways to care and respect it now and for the future.

It is amazing to think The Lorax was written 49 years ago addressing industrial and environmental issues that are still being discussed today.

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