Welcome to our last newsletter for 2023. I would like to take this opportunity to thank all those who have been involved in the preparation and production of our newsletter throughout the year.  Thanks for Father Hoang and Fr Tien for their weekly homilies about which we get such positive feedback.   Thank you to Cathy Jenkins and Anne Rennie for their monthly faith reflections.  Cathy and Anne each bring the fruits of their own lived faith life to their regular columns and we all look forward to reading them each month.  This year a special thanks to Father Peter Malone who has inspired us to get to the movies with his It’s show time column each month.  If you are heading to the movies over the summer holidays then go back and check out our parish blog to catch up with Fr Peter’s recommendations!

Thanks to Father Frank O’Loughlin for his regular Understanding our Faith column each week.  We are in for a treat in 2024 as Fr Frank has just completed another book on the future of the Church.  Frank has been prolific with his writing since moving to Surrey Hills with an average of one book a year!  Keep writing Fr Frank.

I am grateful to our three school communities who contribute to School Voices each month.  It is important that we hear the voices of our young people in our newsletter.  It is particularly great to hear the prayers and reflections that they produce throughout the year.  Over Advent one of our young parishioners has been producing his own reflections on each of the Sunday readings.  Check out the Tom Nunan’s reflections and ‘like’ them, to encourage this initiative.  Well done Tom.

Thanks to Kate Baines for profiling the various charitable works and collections that happen throughout the year, to Tricia Norman for coordinating and creating Advent and Lenten enrichment materials each year.  Thanks for Sandy Curnow and other writers who contribute from time to time with various stories and reflections.  And thank you to Sally McIntosh for pulling all of this together and giving us the newsletter that arrives in our inbox every Friday afternoon at 6:00 pm.

Apart from these regular articles there are notices for around a dozen upcoming activities across our parishes that appear in the newsletter every week.  These represent the life and ministries of our parishes and hundreds of peoples faith, which they are prepared to share with others.

If you have liked any section of our newsletter or have suggestions for 2024 please respond in the comments section below!

In the meantime we are heading towards the final week of Advent and the Christmas Season.  Please note that as the fourth Sunday of Advent fall on Christmas Eve we have a revised timetable for Masses on that day.  On the weekend of 23 and 24 December we will celebrate a Vigil Mass in each parish and only two Masses on Sunday morning (9:00 am at Balwyn and 10:00 am at Camberwell).  There will be no 10:30 am Mass at either Our Holy Redeemer or Our Lady of Good Counsel and no 9:00 am Mass at Our Lady’s, Wattle Park. Christmas Eve Masses will commence from 6:00 pm on the 24 December.  Please check our website for all the details of Masses for the Fourth Sunday of Advent and Christmas weekend.

By Fr Brendan Reed

Published: 15 December 2023