Mary MacKillop Today Community Grants Program 2023
September 6, 2022Applications for the Mary MacKillop Today’s Community Grants Program 2023 are currently open and will close at 5pm on Friday 23 September 2022 (AEST).
Eligible organisations may apply for grants of up to AU$10,000 to deliver small, life-changing projects that promote life-long learning for Australians affected by vulnerability.
National Child Protection Week 2022
August 23, 2022
Australia observes National Child Protection Week each September, as part of a nationwide initiative to protect children from abuse and neglect, recognising that protecting children is a whole of community responsibility.
The National Association for Prevention of Child Abuse and Neglect (NAPCAN) aims to raise the Australian community’s awareness of child abuse and neglect and create safer communities for children. By bringing child abuse and neglect out of the shadows, it assists in keeping child wellbeing on the national agenda.
This year marks the 32nd celebration of National Child Protection Week, with the continuation of the message that ‘Every child, in every community, needs a fair go’, whilst shining a light on children growing up safe and supported.
Listen to the Voice of Creation

Come, now! I will send you… I will be with you.
The most overused word in the journalists’ lexicon these days is ‘unprecedented’. We hear of ‘unprecedented floods’, ‘unprecedented bushfires’, an ‘unprecedented drought’ – all the ‘unprecedented’ impact of climate change on women, men, and children across the globe.
Social Justice Sunday 2022

On this side of the grave.
But then, once in a lifetime
The longed-for tidal wave
Of justice can rise up,
And hope and history rhyme.
As we watch the directions taken by the newly sworn-in Australian Government, we experience encouraging anticipation that hope and history might rhyme more closely.
ethica’s actions uplift women and small business
Women artisan groups in Peru.
Each month, Pope Francis asks for our prayers for a specific intention. For the month of August, the prayer intention is for small businesses.
The Pope’s monthly prayer intentions are a call for all of us to transform our prayers into actions; with compassion for the world, to build a more humane and caring world through prayer and action.
Father Founder – A Tasmanian Connection

In education these days, there is a practice where a teacher may use a ‘provocation’. This is an object or artefact, a photo or a poem that is a stimulus for thought and discussion. A launching pad for learning.
In writing this reflection, and thinking about Father’s Day (4 September), and the role of Julian Tenison Woods as Father Founder of the Sisters of Saint Joseph, my mind was immediately drawn to an item we have in the display case in our Julian room at the Josephite Mission and History Centre in Hobart. It is Julian’s priestly collar in a battered case with a handwritten note from Mary MacKillop to the Tasmanian Sisters.
National Vocations Awareness Week 2022
August 8, 2022This year’s National Vocations Awareness Week begins on 7 August and concludes on 14 August. During this week, we also celebrate the feast of Saint Mary MacKillop on 8 August.
Indigenous women defend a sacred river in Peru
To commemorate the International Day of the World’s Indigenous Peoples (9 August), Barbara Fraser, a freelance journalist based in Lima, Peru, shares a story about how Indigenous women are defending a sacred river in Peru.
Like most Kukama women in Peru’s northeastern Amazonian region, Mari Luz Canaquiri’s life centers on the Marañón River.