A Word from the Chaplain

Our year began with Mass to mark the start of the academic year, at which time we welcomed back our high achievers to recognize the fulfilment of their hard work and also invested the College Leaders for 2014.

Ash Wednesday took a new turn this year with individual Homeroom liturgies. It is a major event in the liturgical year and an opportunity at the beginning of the year to establish a spiritual presence in the College, especially for the new cohort.

Student Special Ministers

Once again we invited a group of students to undertake a training program to serve the DLS community as Special Ministers of the Eucharist. These impressive young men offered their peer group a special example of faith in action.

The Year 7 Spiritual Initiation Program

“Celebrating Catholic Life” has spanned the year, taking in all Year 7 students in small groups. The program serves to welcome and initiate students into both the Catholicity of the College and an understanding of the Lasallian ethos; which involves them in reflection, discussion and searching to discover their own beliefs, creeds, spiritual celebration and determination in the road ahead. We aim in this initiation program to help the boys tap into their own inner strength and goodness and consider ways in which they can use their gifts to make a difference during their years at De La Salle and in the wider world.

Easter Season

Following a whole school memorial of the Easter Feasts, our primary classes gathered for their own pageant. Year 6 students had prepared Stations of the Cross in sculptured wire and to the music of Avici’s Hey Brother portrayed the Gospel accounts in cameo performances. The Year 4 students, under the creative eye of Mrs Finn, wove together a tapestry of the Easter story in an art work created in an Australian indigenous representation. The Year 5 students highlighted the message by leading us all in a festival of light as each student added their lit taper to the sand, we were reminded in song that Jesus asked us to “Do this in Memory of Me”.

Reconciliation, First Eucharist and Confirmation

36 students from Years 4 to 8 participated in the Sacrament program and we remain grateful to St Anthony’s Glen Huntly for the support they generously offer our students. As Lent commenced, so too did eleven students launch into preparation for the Sacrament of first Reconciliation. The Chapel filled with excited chatter as families gathered to celebrate the Second Rite of Reconciliation for the first time. Father Dillon, an old boy of the College, administered the Sacrament on Tuesday 29 April in the Tiverton Chapel, in the presence of family and friends. Father Dillon spoke to the boys and their families about being true to themselves and standing up for what they believe in. Mr Houlihan, Principal, presented the students with a gift and congratulated them on taking this step towards a deeper relationship with the Lord.

Confirmation

Eighteen students from Year 6 to Year 8 participated; Brock Augustynski, Owen Davies, Thomas Easton, William Martin, Liam McCaffrey, Andrew McGaw, Julian Ober, James Pavlou, Thomas Richards, Tom Robinson, Thomas Simpson, Byron Gelagin, Harvey Sparks, Gabriel Strain-King, Nathan Barrow, Michael Skehan, Kai Bloomfield and Mitchell Rogers were Confirmed on Sunday 10 August by Bishop Elliott. Five students also received the Eucharist for the first time. The Bishop took great delight in this latter group as they came to Eucharist in the ancient apostolic tradition.

First Communion

Sunday 26 October saw twelve of our students from Year 4 to Year 6 receive Eucharist for the first time. Congratulations to Alex Basile, Samuel Herdman, Harry King, Max Kolpin, Peter Pearse, William Richards, Benjamin Selkirk, James Simpson, Jasper Sparks, William Skehan, Harrison Barber and Isaac Ford. Their families engaged in a Sunday Retreat Day, a Home Mass and the boys in a wonderful Reconciliation Service in the process of their preparation. Mrs Joan Ferguson College Chaplain