Tenison Woods and MacKillop Centre News: A share of God's hospitality

[John] said to them in reply,
"Whoever has two cloaks
should share with the person who has none.
And whoever has food should do likewise."

Luke 3:11

John captures the essence of the message that Jesus would soon clearly proclaim. One of the key themes that runs right through Luke’s gospel is the hospitality of God. And while we in the 21^st century think of hospitality as something we offer invited guests, the radical Lucan view is that hospitality is an obligation on each of us as we mirror the constancy of God’s generosity to the stranger. The risks of hosting strangers is as likely to be as dangerous today as it was in the ancient near east, and that is the very tension that this kind of hospitality produces.

Hospitality is freely given. The writer of the letter to the Hebrews (13:1 – 2) reminded the early Christians: Let mutual love continue. Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing that some have entertained angels without knowing it. (Hebrews 13:1-2). And one of the most famous stories is of Abraham’s visitors who announced that his wife Sarah will bear a child in her old age (Genesis 18:1 – 8) and this is repeated in the story of Elizabeth and Zechariah (Luke 1:5 – 23). The wonderful story of the disciples walking to Emmaus (Luke 24:13 – 35) ends with the revelation that the stranger to whom they have given hospitality is indeed the Lord himself. The feeding of the great crowd (Luke 9:10 – 17) is the greatest gift of hospitality, even more so despite the protestations of the disciples. Jesus’ parable of the Good Samaritan stunned his Jewish audience (Luke 10:25 – 37).

There are those in our world who are strangers by choice – migrants, tourists and travellers; there are those who are strangers because there is no choice – refugees and evacuees. We can choose to make them welcome, or we can ignore them or reject them. In the end, as Christians, we are asked to measure our response against the Gospel. Let’s not forget, however, that there is enormous generosity in our community – perhaps it is a step back from opening the doors of our homes, but we generously support the victims of bush fires, floods, earthquakes, the bereaved, the homeless, the sick, medical research.

The anxiety that comes from welcoming strangers to our table is the possibility that like Abraham and Sarah, or the angelic visit to the young Mary or to Zachariah, is that there may be great news to be heard, that it is not we who give blessings to the stranger, but that is they who bless us.

This coming Sunday is the 3^rd Sunday of Advent and is also called Gaudete Sunday because the entrance verse for the Mass of the day begins with: Gaudete in Domino semper" (Rejoice in the Lord always).

Peter Douglas

HEAD OF SCHOOL SERVICES, NORTH

Curriculum EO: Bobbi-Jo Bailey

Bobbi-Jo is based in Launceston and services all schools in the North Region.

Learnings for the year:

God – He is always with us in our endeavours to ensure teachers and learners are supported to flourish. He is my honest mirror and greatest encourager.

Leadership – the art of leadership with all its delights and complexities, continue to fascinate me. I am thankful for the efforts and commitment of the leaders in our organization, particularly principals and assistant principals.

Teamwork – together, we make the difference to each other and others. Division and unresolved conflict wastes energy and keeps us from being productive.

Formative Assessment – we’ve heard the words often but learning intentions and success criteria, eliciting evidence, providing feedback that moves learning forward are key to effective teaching and learning.

Backward Design – to proforma or not to proforma – that is the question! It’s the process of conceptual planning, useful assessments, and flexible and supportive learning sequences (with the end in mind) that makes for effective teaching and learning. There’s more to include but that’s it in a nutshell.

Data – using it effectively to analyze where we are now and where we want to be, guides us in deciding how we will get there. It’s a collective effort.

Highlights – #1 learning and practising cognitive coaching skills – mostly on APs!! Sometimes, I was really in the zone, and others – not sure where the zone was actually?! However, with CC, the solutions lie within and mediative questions play such a key role in nudging our thinking along. #2 planning and learning with APs. Thank you for your pursuits as lead learners – thank you too for your insights, challenges and collegiality. #3 co-labouring with N and NW Regional EOs – I can perform in this role, because they play their part so well across the region.

#4 peer-focused feedback – focused discussion, focused practice in action and focused feedback – it has been a privilege to be part of this process across a variety of schools – thank you to the teachers who been involved with this.

Teacher Reflection

If I were to step back in to a classroom in 2016, I would definitely want to give greater attention to the following:

- experiment with using technology more to elicit evidence – choose just a few, reliable apps and exploit them!

- engage students more with oral language opportunities before I expected them to problem-solve, read or write,

- use running records more frequently to understand the reading behaviours of my students, to inform the next step, and

- teach mathematics with more of a facilitative approach – building on my growing belief that children are natural problem-solvers

My favourite quote of the year:

We will take collective responsibility to ensure all of our students learn at high levels. (Buffum)

See you all in 2016 – God bless you and have a great break!

Thomas Merton, Pope Francis and Graham Greene

By Joanna Thyer

The writer and Trappist monk Thomas Merton, the famous British writer, Graham Greene, and our current pope, Pope Francis, have a lot in common. Merton died in 1968 – from accidental electrocution whilst touring in Thailand, and Greene died peacefully in 1991. Both men were converts to Catholicism. Like Pope Francis, Merton engaged in interfaith dialogue. What these three men have in common, however, is that their works reveal them to be visionaries and mystics with a faith message for the world, a message that does not shy away from naming and engaging with the darkness around us.

Graham Greene led an eclectic life, and embraced and dialogued with the complex world around him. After his conversion to Catholicism in the 1920s, he was commissioned to go to Mexico to report on religious persecution there which resulted in him writing one of his famous novels, The Power and the Glory. He was adept at characterising the flawed broken priest or individual who could still bring Christ to others, despite his brokenness. The internal struggle of the soul to find and receive grace was amongst the issues that consumed him. As he so well depicted in another work, The Heart of the Matter, he understood the paradox of how a person’s conscience and love of God, could also lead them to disaster.

Greene confronted and explored the world of international politics, espionage and the world of corruption, (he worked for MI6 at one stage). He took a stand on moral issues – he allegedly quit the American Academy of Arts and Letters over America’s involvement in the Vietnam War.

A serial adulterer and womaniser, he explored flawed and complex interpersonal relationships in his writing, such as in his famous work, The End of the Affair. He was by his own admission, a man who struggled with his own sins whilst balancing a passionate faith. Able to deepen and challenge his own religious and spiritual beliefs amidst a rich and tumultuous life, his flawed and complex nature both informed his writing, and furthered his faith as a devout Catholic.

Both Merton and Greene struggled with the dynamics of interpersonal relationships and the struggle between the human soul, desire and what God’s direction and actions in a person’s life and the world around them, meant. Merton was also flawed, and allegedly quite headstrong in his inner and outer battles, and in his relationship with his monastic community. Books about Merton have been written saying he was not as ‘holy’ as he seemed and his personal diaries also talk about the love affair he had with a nurse for a while during his time as a monk in the 1960s. Yet these revelations are indications of a multi-faceted individual whose humanity fuelled his wisdom. Like Greene, Merton’s life experience and the wisdom he imparted to the world, enriched his faith. This is an example to all of us.

Like Pope Francis, Merton saw the great wisdom of the Tibetan Buddhist and Hindu traditions, or metaphorically how ‘the sun sets in the East’. Whilst some have critiqued this perceived duality in Merton towards the end of his life, it reveals the depth of his quest to follow where God was leading him. Ironically, only days before his death in Bangkok, Merton had an epiphany whilst reflecting on the beauty of Eastern spiritual experience. In contemplating the ‘dharmahaya’ where ‘everything is emptiness and everything is compassion’ he reflected: “I have now seen and have pierced through the surface and have got beyond the shadow and the disguise”.

In his book Church of Mercy, Pope Francis advises us to read the signs of God in our lives, be guided by the Spirit, and go beyond our comfort zone. Pope Francis’ washing of a female Muslim prisoner’s feet early in his pontificate is a dramatic example of how actions speak louder than words. The subtext of that action could readily be understood as demonstrating how Christ’s love really works. He has not played it safe. He understands the world he is in, and does not separate himself from it. His message is a metaphor for an individual’s spiritual life. He does not want a closed Church, but an open one, and emphasises that “a bruised Church is better than an ill Church”.

Like Pope Francis, Greene and Merton were individuals whose sheer complexity equipped them to address the often contradictory world we live in, in order to find God in it. The lives of such people do not make them saints, yet they do exemplify their status as mystics who contribute to the spiritual development of others.

At a time when religious persecution is rife, when extremists on either side have hijacked and distorted many religious beliefs, in a violent, chaotic and often uncertain world, the lives of people like Pope Francis, Thomas Merton and Graham Greene have a message for us: to embrace the brokenness in the world and in our own lives and find love and God in it. Their message seems to embody what Graham Greene once famously said, “When we are not sure, we are alive”.

* The Good Oil, November 17, 2015. Joanna Thyer is a writer, Sydney hospital chaplain, and educator. Her most recent work is 12 Steps to Spiritual Freedom, (Loyola Press, 2014).