Jesus taught us that if we wanted God to forgive us, then we must first learn to forgive each other.  In Sunday’s Gospel, he tells a parable about a forgiving King and his unforgiving servant.  The important point in this story is not that the servant earned forgiveness, but rather his master granted it spontaneously despite the servant’s unworthiness and then the servant refused to reflect the master’s generosity in dealing with his fellow servant.  When we forgive others who have hurt us, we don’t do it to earn forgiveness from God but to manifest God’s implacably forgiving love.  If we refuse to forgive others, even their smallest transgressions, will we be any better than the unrepentant servant?  The moral of the story is clear:  as the Lord always forgives us from the inner depths of his heart, we, too, must forgive others.

This week at Holy Spirit we value friendliness.  Friendliness is a quality of openness and warmth that makes you feel welcome and at ease.  Your friendliness is evident in your facial expressions, body language and, most importantly, in the way you treat other people.  The story from Sunday is a good reminder of God’s love and forgiveness and how we should treat other people.  While we don’t have to be ‘best’ friends with everyone, we should always try to be friendly to those we meet or interact with.  We can look at how we can spread God’s love and mercy to others.  This week we pray that our students show the value of being friendly towards others by making everyone feel welcome and try to recognise everyone’s special gifts and talents to help them feel valued.  We also pray they try to do what is right and to share God’s love for everyone they meet, particularly those people who seem lonely or sad.

Congratulations to our Year 6 students who participated in the Mini Vinnies homelessness experience.  We welcomed Mary McAuliffe to our school, the Youth Engagement and Development Officer for the Townsville Diocese St Vincent de Paul Society Queensland.  Mary spoke to the students, sharing information on the number of people experiencing homelessness across Australia and how we can help.  The children also participated in a number of activities to raise awareness of homelessness.  

Thank you to our families who sent in cleaning products as this year’s donation to assist those in need moving into accommodation.  You can still be part of this worthy cause by sending cleaning products in to our school.  These will be passed on to Mary at the end of this week.  Donations can be given to the class teacher or handed in to the office.

Congratulations to our second group of students who received the Sacraments of Confirmation and First Eucharist on Sunday with the Holy Spirit Parish.  Despite being restricted by COVID-19 regulations, it was once again lovely to see families and friends support the children on their faith journey. 

God bless.

Caroline Fuller