Stella Newsletter
Well done Year 12 2024!
The first of our HSC Practical Examination results indicate that students are doing well with eight student works nominated for Design and Technology, two student works nominated for Industrial Technology and nine student works nominated for Textile Technology for inclusion in the SHAPE exhibition. Five Drama students were nominated for their group performance, two students were nominated for their group performance and one student nominated for her monologue performance for inclusion in OnStage. Three Dance students were each nominated in two categories for OnStage. Nominations don’t necessarily mean the works will be exhibited or students will perform but it does indicate the work being produced is of high quality. Well done girls!
Celebrating Scholastica Gibbons
During October (16 October) we remember Mother Scholastica Gibbons who, with Archbishop John Bede Polding, established the first Australian congregation, the Sisters of the Good Samaritan of the Order of St Benedict, founded on 2 February 1857.
Geraldine Gibbons was born in Kinsale, County Cork, Ireland in 1817. She emigrated to Australia with her family in 1834. In 1847 she was professed as a Sister of Charity. In 1848 she established a home for penitent women in Campbell Street and then Carter's Barracks in Pitt Street in March 1849. This was the starting point of ministry for the Good Samaritan Sisters.
In 1856 Scholastica was selected the Mother General of the Sisters of Charity. A year later Archbishop Polding asked her to serve as superior both to her own congregation, and to a new Australian congregation, the Community of the Good Shepherd (renamed the Sisters of the Good Samaritan in 1866). At the same time the Sisters of Charity under her leadership were establishing St Vincent’s Hospital in Sydney. With zeal and great industry, Scholastica Gibbons guided the early sisters along the way of the Gospel and the Rule of St Benedict. She inspired and led both groups of women to embrace the call of mission and respond with compassion to the poor and destitute in the fledgling colony of Sydney.
Scholastica always remained a Sister of Charity. She died at the Good Samaritan Convent, Marrickville on October 15, 1901.
The life of Scholastica Gibbons shows a willingness to answer one’s calling and live with integrity in the face of tensions and at times, criticism. A woman of great courage, Scholastica was prepared to embrace a broader vision of the Church of Australia, and two religious congregations remain as monuments to her faithfulness to Gospel living.