Staff Profiles – Chaplains
MATTHEW PALMER & MATTHEW STEELE-SMITH
Left: Matthew Steele-Smith. Right: Matthew Palmer.
A CONVERSATION WITH THE TWO MATTS How long have you worked at St Paul’s?
MP: I started working at St Paul’s in January 2019. MSS: I’ve worked at St Paul’s since July 2018. Where did you grow up?
MP: I grew up in Campbelltown in the Macarthur region and went to school in Liverpool. MSS: I grew up in and around Epping with my parents and an extremely nerdy older brother.
10 FUTURUM SUMMER 2020
Tell us about your journey to becoming a Chaplain. MP: I came into teaching with an education degree and a youth ministry background. While working in schools, I have taught and coordinated Personal Development, Health and Physical Education (PDHPE) and Christian Studies Faculties. During this time, I was studying at Sydney Missionary and Bible College and thinking about the Gospel needs in our communities and vocations. Chaplaincy fits with theological and education training, and with the Lord working in and around life and faith, the position here at St Paul’s was advertised. With a little encouragement from my
Minister, people at my former workplace, and some key people here at St Paul’s, I applied and was successful. MSS: A few years after I left school, I started working for Cru visiting different lunchtime Christian groups, and I saw the great value and need for school students to have a place where they are free to read and ask questions of the Bible and chat through what it means. So often students are bombarded with messages from all around them and I really saw the value of having a space where students can consider for themselves, perhaps for the first time, the answer to life’s important questions – Why am I here? Is there a God? What is He like?
