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Saturday, July 2, 2011
Thursday, April 15, 2010
What is essential is invisible to the eye
I was told this cute little story a few years ago. It happened in a Catholic Primary School. A little girl, recently arrived in Australia from a refugee camp in Africa, was listening to a talk given by a visitor to her school. The talk was on conditions in the Solomon Islands and what was being done to help the people there. One slide that was shown was of a pathetic little tin shed that served as the community school. It was of course shown to highlight the terrible plight of the people. On seeing the shed however, the little girl was heard to say “O isn’t that lovely.” And she meant it!
“It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.” Antoine de Saint-Exupery in Le Petit Prince (The Little Prince)
The profound truth expressed so succinctly above is one that is often forgotten in our modern, frantic, materialistic society. Thanks to self-interested big business and the often morally challenged media, people have been spun a wonderful myth. Happiness is out there! All we have to do is find it. How do we find it? Well, if we spend enough money on ourselves we are sure to find it. We can even make the people we love happy by buying things for them. There are clothes and jewellery, I-Pod’s and mobile phones, TV’s and DVD’s, computers and coffee machines – the list is endless! There are even people who risk unnecessary major cosmetic surgery in the pursuit of happiness – breast enlargements, face lifts and liposuction and people even go overseas to get them cheap!
Don’t get me wrong. It’s not that there is anything inherently wrong in buying any of these things. The danger is that people, especially young people, can be brainwashed into believing that they need these things to be happy. Worse, they can become depressed or angry that others have more or better things than they do.
The Christian belief is that happiness comes from knowing God and ourselves as well as we possibly can and in serving others first rather than in serving ourselves. In getting to know God, we enter into and strengthen a relationship with our creator, a relationship that can nurture and sustain us through good times and bad. By getting to know ourselves well, we come to know our gifts, abilities and talents as well as our weaknesses, which in turn allow us to decide a meaningful direction in life. In serving others first we actively share the love of God wherever we are in the world. Happiness is an internal sense of self worth and of connectedness with our loving creator and with our fellow human beings. What is essential is invisible to the eye.
Catholic schools in Australia make a real difference to the lives of thousands of young people every day. We are fortunate to live in a country that allows freedom of Religious expression. Our Catholic schools work in partnership with parents, parish and the wider community to provide our young people with the time, teaching and example necessary to get to know themselves and to get to know God. In this way our young men and women come to know that it is only with the heart that one can see rightly.
“It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.” Antoine de Saint-Exupery in Le Petit Prince (The Little Prince)
The profound truth expressed so succinctly above is one that is often forgotten in our modern, frantic, materialistic society. Thanks to self-interested big business and the often morally challenged media, people have been spun a wonderful myth. Happiness is out there! All we have to do is find it. How do we find it? Well, if we spend enough money on ourselves we are sure to find it. We can even make the people we love happy by buying things for them. There are clothes and jewellery, I-Pod’s and mobile phones, TV’s and DVD’s, computers and coffee machines – the list is endless! There are even people who risk unnecessary major cosmetic surgery in the pursuit of happiness – breast enlargements, face lifts and liposuction and people even go overseas to get them cheap!
Don’t get me wrong. It’s not that there is anything inherently wrong in buying any of these things. The danger is that people, especially young people, can be brainwashed into believing that they need these things to be happy. Worse, they can become depressed or angry that others have more or better things than they do.
The Christian belief is that happiness comes from knowing God and ourselves as well as we possibly can and in serving others first rather than in serving ourselves. In getting to know God, we enter into and strengthen a relationship with our creator, a relationship that can nurture and sustain us through good times and bad. By getting to know ourselves well, we come to know our gifts, abilities and talents as well as our weaknesses, which in turn allow us to decide a meaningful direction in life. In serving others first we actively share the love of God wherever we are in the world. Happiness is an internal sense of self worth and of connectedness with our loving creator and with our fellow human beings. What is essential is invisible to the eye.
Catholic schools in Australia make a real difference to the lives of thousands of young people every day. We are fortunate to live in a country that allows freedom of Religious expression. Our Catholic schools work in partnership with parents, parish and the wider community to provide our young people with the time, teaching and example necessary to get to know themselves and to get to know God. In this way our young men and women come to know that it is only with the heart that one can see rightly.
Wednesday, April 7, 2010
The Climate Change Debate
There seems at present to be a great deal of confusion in the general community as to whether or not global warming and climate change are real. Climate change skeptics abound. Lord Monckton, 3rd Viscount of Brenchley for instance, recently toured Australia, including Newcastle, spreading misinformation. In his lectures he disputes whether global warming is man-made, suggests that it is unlikely to prove catastrophic, and criticizes the science presented by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the scientific body established by world governments to provide a clear scientific view on the current state of climate change and its potential environmental and socio-economic consequences. Lord Monckton accuses world governments of conspiring to make money out of the climate change scare by ultimately taking control of world financial markets. It seems to me that Lord Monckton is doing quite nicely out of climate change himself!
Schools are in an ideal position to provide the facts and clarify the issues associated with climate change. Every opportunity to do so must be taken so that our students are accurately informed.
People in the community need to stop debating the science and start debating the politics of the best way to solve the problem. It really makes no sense for people, especially people with no scientific background, to make statements like: “I don’t believe in climate change.” With the huge amount of evidence now collected and analyzed, it is akin to saying “I don’t believe in atoms.” or “I don’t believe in DNA.”
Amongst the scientific community worldwide, the basic understanding surrounding the global warming issue is that warming since the Industrial Revolution is undeniable, it is being driven by human causes, and it presents a distinct threat to the earth’s climate system. Global warming is a definitive reality created by human actions, and it connects at a fundamental level with several other serious problems facing society – the global population crises, the power crises, the global food & water shortage to name a few. Climate change ranks as the single greatest threat to modern society, and the future results will be cataclysmic without effective policies to control the human destruction on the climate. As members of a Catholic school community we have a joint responsibility to get this message out there and to get the debate focused on solving the problem!
Schools are in an ideal position to provide the facts and clarify the issues associated with climate change. Every opportunity to do so must be taken so that our students are accurately informed.
People in the community need to stop debating the science and start debating the politics of the best way to solve the problem. It really makes no sense for people, especially people with no scientific background, to make statements like: “I don’t believe in climate change.” With the huge amount of evidence now collected and analyzed, it is akin to saying “I don’t believe in atoms.” or “I don’t believe in DNA.”
Amongst the scientific community worldwide, the basic understanding surrounding the global warming issue is that warming since the Industrial Revolution is undeniable, it is being driven by human causes, and it presents a distinct threat to the earth’s climate system. Global warming is a definitive reality created by human actions, and it connects at a fundamental level with several other serious problems facing society – the global population crises, the power crises, the global food & water shortage to name a few. Climate change ranks as the single greatest threat to modern society, and the future results will be cataclysmic without effective policies to control the human destruction on the climate. As members of a Catholic school community we have a joint responsibility to get this message out there and to get the debate focused on solving the problem!
Creativity
Mention the word “creativity” and people usually think of some famous artist or musician. Most people do not consider themselves to be particularly creative. One of the essential goals of modern education must surely be to change this perception.
Creativity can be defined in many ways but I especially like Sir Ken Robinson’s definition. Sir Ken is one of the world’s most highly respected thinkers on creativity and education and his view is that:
“Creativity is the process of having original ideas that have value”.
Defined in this way it is easy to see that every human being can be creative in many different ways. Every teacher and every parent needs to be conscious of this fact when interacting with our children. We must nurture creativity in our children not stifle it by insisting that children always conform to our own ways of thinking or to our own ways of doing things. We must encourage our children to think outside the square and we must support them in their efforts when they do so.
History is full of examples of people who changed the world by thinking outside the square. We can all name the famous examples from the history books or from the newspapers – the explorers, the leaders, the academics, the entrepreneurs and yes the great artists, musicians and writers. What we need to remember though, is that there are countless examples of everyday men and women who make wonderfully creative contributions to their workplaces, societies and communities, often without ever being formally recognized or rewarded for doing so. We can all do it. We should all strive to do it.
Over the next few years, teachers in all schools must face the many challenges that 21st Century education brings. One of those challenges is to foster creativity in all our students, in all areas of the curriculum. If we are to do this, we must relinquish our time-honoured position of gatekeeper to knowledge. We must accept that the students sitting in front of us, even in Year 7, know how to access more knowledge than they could use in a lifetime. We must accept that our students know far more about technology and how to use it than we will ever know. This can be a frightening fact but it need not be. This realisation can be very liberating. This realisation can liberate us from that old industrial paradigm of education and can allow us to reconceptualise our role. We can begin to explore the roles of learning mentor, learning consultant, learning motivator.
To foster creativity amongst all our students, we must be creative ourselves and be open to new ways of thinking, new ways of doing, and new ways of being “teacher”. In the words of one famous creative thinker and innovator, Albert Einstein:
“The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results”.
All this sounds like hard work and a lot of it. What, then, is our motivation for doing all this hard work? I believe that high quality teaching and learning is a moral imperative. The provision of excellent teaching that facilitates student engagement, sets high expectations, encourages creativity and ensures a high level of social support for all students is essential to enabling the best possible learning outcomes for students. We owe the next generations our best work.
Creativity can be defined in many ways but I especially like Sir Ken Robinson’s definition. Sir Ken is one of the world’s most highly respected thinkers on creativity and education and his view is that:
“Creativity is the process of having original ideas that have value”.
Defined in this way it is easy to see that every human being can be creative in many different ways. Every teacher and every parent needs to be conscious of this fact when interacting with our children. We must nurture creativity in our children not stifle it by insisting that children always conform to our own ways of thinking or to our own ways of doing things. We must encourage our children to think outside the square and we must support them in their efforts when they do so.
History is full of examples of people who changed the world by thinking outside the square. We can all name the famous examples from the history books or from the newspapers – the explorers, the leaders, the academics, the entrepreneurs and yes the great artists, musicians and writers. What we need to remember though, is that there are countless examples of everyday men and women who make wonderfully creative contributions to their workplaces, societies and communities, often without ever being formally recognized or rewarded for doing so. We can all do it. We should all strive to do it.
Over the next few years, teachers in all schools must face the many challenges that 21st Century education brings. One of those challenges is to foster creativity in all our students, in all areas of the curriculum. If we are to do this, we must relinquish our time-honoured position of gatekeeper to knowledge. We must accept that the students sitting in front of us, even in Year 7, know how to access more knowledge than they could use in a lifetime. We must accept that our students know far more about technology and how to use it than we will ever know. This can be a frightening fact but it need not be. This realisation can be very liberating. This realisation can liberate us from that old industrial paradigm of education and can allow us to reconceptualise our role. We can begin to explore the roles of learning mentor, learning consultant, learning motivator.
To foster creativity amongst all our students, we must be creative ourselves and be open to new ways of thinking, new ways of doing, and new ways of being “teacher”. In the words of one famous creative thinker and innovator, Albert Einstein:
“The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results”.
All this sounds like hard work and a lot of it. What, then, is our motivation for doing all this hard work? I believe that high quality teaching and learning is a moral imperative. The provision of excellent teaching that facilitates student engagement, sets high expectations, encourages creativity and ensures a high level of social support for all students is essential to enabling the best possible learning outcomes for students. We owe the next generations our best work.
Saturday, March 20, 2010
Do We Derserve Their Sacrifice?
I am sure many people remember the movie “Saving Private Ryan”. Set at the time of the D-Day landings in Normandy in 1944, it is a graphic portrayal of the violence and horror of war. The story follows Captain John Miller and his men as they search for a young soldier, Private James Ryan. Ryan’s three brothers have been killed in action and the army chiefs want Ryan found and returned safely to his family who have already suffered loss beyond belief.
Many of Miller’s men are killed in the search for Ryan and in helping Ryan’s platoon to stop the German Army from capturing a vital bridge. After fierce fighting, the German soldiers have been defeated and Captain Miller himself lies dying on the bridge.
In a poignant scene Miller beckons Ryan to come to him. With his last breath Miller whispers: "James... earn this. Earn it." As Miller dies, the movie brings us back to the present and to a much older James Ryan standing over Miller’s grave in a military cemetery in France. As he stands there, Ryan asks his wife to reassure him that he has lived a good life. Has the life he has led been good enough to repay the debt he owes Miller and his squad for their enormous sacrifice?
In a little over a month from now we will celebrate Anzac Day. On that special day we will remember, honour, thank and pray for those who fought to defend our nation and the many who made the ultimate sacrifice. As Christians, however, we are called to make a bigger commitment than a single day of remembrance. We best honour and thank our Service men and women by living lives that strive to earn the sacrifice they made. We need to love, respect and care for one another every day. We need to live lives that are positive, uplifting and enriching to all those with whom we come into contact. We need to strive to achieve our full potential and to be the very best people that we can be, not just when we feel like it but all the time. When we live our lives in this way we honour all those who have made sacrifices for us. When we live in this way, the sacrifices that others have made on our behalf are never in vain.
I remember watching a story on the ABC TV program Stateline that dealt with three young men who took on the arduous trek along the grueling Kokoda Trail. The men in their late teens spoke of their journey as a life changing experience. One of the men, Stephen, explained how extremely difficult it had been for him both physically and emotionally to walk this trail that his grandfather had fought on in WWII. He said he could not imagine how the young soldiers had even carried their heavy packs, weapons and equipment over the dense terrain, let alone how they had fought fierce battles as they went along. His thoughts at the end of his ordeal were profound.
He asked the question: “Do we deserve their sacrifice?” He went on to say: “Our generation must live in a way to make their sacrifice worthwhile. Our generation must live in a way that would make them proud.”
Let us pray that we can all live in such a way.
Many of Miller’s men are killed in the search for Ryan and in helping Ryan’s platoon to stop the German Army from capturing a vital bridge. After fierce fighting, the German soldiers have been defeated and Captain Miller himself lies dying on the bridge.
In a poignant scene Miller beckons Ryan to come to him. With his last breath Miller whispers: "James... earn this. Earn it." As Miller dies, the movie brings us back to the present and to a much older James Ryan standing over Miller’s grave in a military cemetery in France. As he stands there, Ryan asks his wife to reassure him that he has lived a good life. Has the life he has led been good enough to repay the debt he owes Miller and his squad for their enormous sacrifice?
In a little over a month from now we will celebrate Anzac Day. On that special day we will remember, honour, thank and pray for those who fought to defend our nation and the many who made the ultimate sacrifice. As Christians, however, we are called to make a bigger commitment than a single day of remembrance. We best honour and thank our Service men and women by living lives that strive to earn the sacrifice they made. We need to love, respect and care for one another every day. We need to live lives that are positive, uplifting and enriching to all those with whom we come into contact. We need to strive to achieve our full potential and to be the very best people that we can be, not just when we feel like it but all the time. When we live our lives in this way we honour all those who have made sacrifices for us. When we live in this way, the sacrifices that others have made on our behalf are never in vain.
I remember watching a story on the ABC TV program Stateline that dealt with three young men who took on the arduous trek along the grueling Kokoda Trail. The men in their late teens spoke of their journey as a life changing experience. One of the men, Stephen, explained how extremely difficult it had been for him both physically and emotionally to walk this trail that his grandfather had fought on in WWII. He said he could not imagine how the young soldiers had even carried their heavy packs, weapons and equipment over the dense terrain, let alone how they had fought fierce battles as they went along. His thoughts at the end of his ordeal were profound.
He asked the question: “Do we deserve their sacrifice?” He went on to say: “Our generation must live in a way to make their sacrifice worthwhile. Our generation must live in a way that would make them proud.”
Let us pray that we can all live in such a way.
Respect
A few weeks before he was elected pope, Cardinal Ratzinger said at the funeral of Luigi Giussani, founder of the renewal movement known as Communion and liberation, “Christianity is not an intellectual system, a collection of dogmas, or a moralism. Christianity is instead an encounter, a love story, an event.”
At the heart of Christianity is Jesus’ commandment of love – “love one another as I have loved you”. Putting this commandment into action every day, as we are expected to do requires of us a deep respect for human life and indeed for all of God’s creations. Respect for one another as human beings is essential if any of the other Gospel values we claim to live by are to be allowed to flourish.
This respect we speak of cannot be some sort of ethereal act of being nice to people when we choose to be. This respect requires that we choose to empathise with every person we come into contact with. This respect requires that we can put ourselves in the other person’s shoes and appreciate how they feel. This is a tall order but there are ways by which we can train ourselves to be better at respecting others.
Day in and day out, situations arise where we have the opportunity to either uplift people or to put them down. When we choose each time to lift people up and make them feel good about themselves, make them feel appreciated, make them feel loved, we are exercising our respect for other people, our love of one another.
We are all the less for those times when someone makes a snide remark to a friend about another person’s short-comings, or makes some insidious comment about someone out loud at a gathering or meeting, or uses someone’s mistake or misfortune as a source public amusement. We can easily laugh such happenings off as a joke, as some light-hearted fun. Do we ever stop to think what gives us the right to make such a comment? Do we ever stop to think about how that person would feel if or when they hear these remarks? Do we care? We should. In fact, there is something very hard-hearted and wrong about us if we don’t. The whole community loses a little bit of vitality, a little bit of energy, a little bit of goodness every time someone utters a needless negative about another human being.
People have faults. People do stupid things. People make mistakes. People have arguments and fights with one another. People sometimes need to be “told” or disciplined or dressed down. I am not suggesting that we can eliminate these things. They are all part of the human condition. I am suggesting that we can eliminate those unnecessary, negative, banal and often churlish comments that pop out the instant the thought comes into our heads. I am suggesting we can eliminate entirely the “put-downs” and the “belittling” and the “verbal bullying” that sometimes occurs in every community. It is unhealthy, unchristian and unnecessary. A smidgin of self-control and a pinch of empathy is all it takes!
What a wonderful place our world would be if we all chose to actively show our respect and love for one another every day.
At the heart of Christianity is Jesus’ commandment of love – “love one another as I have loved you”. Putting this commandment into action every day, as we are expected to do requires of us a deep respect for human life and indeed for all of God’s creations. Respect for one another as human beings is essential if any of the other Gospel values we claim to live by are to be allowed to flourish.
This respect we speak of cannot be some sort of ethereal act of being nice to people when we choose to be. This respect requires that we choose to empathise with every person we come into contact with. This respect requires that we can put ourselves in the other person’s shoes and appreciate how they feel. This is a tall order but there are ways by which we can train ourselves to be better at respecting others.
Day in and day out, situations arise where we have the opportunity to either uplift people or to put them down. When we choose each time to lift people up and make them feel good about themselves, make them feel appreciated, make them feel loved, we are exercising our respect for other people, our love of one another.
We are all the less for those times when someone makes a snide remark to a friend about another person’s short-comings, or makes some insidious comment about someone out loud at a gathering or meeting, or uses someone’s mistake or misfortune as a source public amusement. We can easily laugh such happenings off as a joke, as some light-hearted fun. Do we ever stop to think what gives us the right to make such a comment? Do we ever stop to think about how that person would feel if or when they hear these remarks? Do we care? We should. In fact, there is something very hard-hearted and wrong about us if we don’t. The whole community loses a little bit of vitality, a little bit of energy, a little bit of goodness every time someone utters a needless negative about another human being.
People have faults. People do stupid things. People make mistakes. People have arguments and fights with one another. People sometimes need to be “told” or disciplined or dressed down. I am not suggesting that we can eliminate these things. They are all part of the human condition. I am suggesting that we can eliminate those unnecessary, negative, banal and often churlish comments that pop out the instant the thought comes into our heads. I am suggesting we can eliminate entirely the “put-downs” and the “belittling” and the “verbal bullying” that sometimes occurs in every community. It is unhealthy, unchristian and unnecessary. A smidgin of self-control and a pinch of empathy is all it takes!
What a wonderful place our world would be if we all chose to actively show our respect and love for one another every day.
Rumours
“Hey mate, did you hear what Sally Hotstuff got up to with Jonny Hopeful at the party the other night? Well apparently bla, bla, bla, yadda, yadda, yadda.” Lola Loudmouth has launched another rumour rocket and this one is so good poor little Sally probably won’t recover. Wicked Lola can now sit back and watch it fly via word of mouth, mobile phone, MSN, email, Facebook, Twitter and so on. She can rest assured that her few seconds worth of malicious gossip will cause maximum shock, pain and awe because she knows it will spread far and wide.
Who knows what Sally and Jonny actually got up to? If the truth be known, they may have been outside discussing differential calculus. The truth? Who needs that? Certainly not Lola. She’s so jealous of Sally she just wants to bring her down a peg or two. Yeah, stretch the truth a bit. That’ll teach her a lesson. What a hoot!
But wait; does Lola deserve all the blame? What about the busy little bees who buzz about spreading the story? Without them, there is no rumour. But how were they to know the story wasn’t true? Here’s a thought. The bees could check the validity of the story? They could buzz around and ask a few other people what they saw. If Lola ends up being the only source of the juicy story, in a Christian community, the bees would keep their mouths shut. If after careful checking, the story seems to be true, the bees need to decide what possible good can come from spreading the story. If the answer to that question is “no good at all, only pain and humiliation”, then again in a Christian community I would suggest the story should not be told.
Whether it is intentional or not, most rumours hurt someone. They cause humiliation. They cause pain. They destroy reputations and lives. For these reasons, telling rumours about someone is considered harassment at the very least and at its worst it constitutes serious bullying. Rumours that are spread via national telecommunications networks (phones & Internet) may also be criminal depending on what is said. Rumours and those who spread them are negative elements that our community could well do without. Good people do not start or spread rumours.
Catholic Schools accept their role in educating students in Christian values and socially responsible behaviour. We are here to support parents in educating their children in the right way to live in relationship with others. We must work together to ensure that our children are taught to think for themselves and not just believe whatever they hear. We must work together to ensure that our children are taught why it is wrong to start or spread rumours. We must work together to ensure that our children are taught the value of always seeking and speaking the truth. Let’s work together as a community to eradicate rumours from our school. Let’s stop telling rumours or malicious stories about people!
Who knows what Sally and Jonny actually got up to? If the truth be known, they may have been outside discussing differential calculus. The truth? Who needs that? Certainly not Lola. She’s so jealous of Sally she just wants to bring her down a peg or two. Yeah, stretch the truth a bit. That’ll teach her a lesson. What a hoot!
But wait; does Lola deserve all the blame? What about the busy little bees who buzz about spreading the story? Without them, there is no rumour. But how were they to know the story wasn’t true? Here’s a thought. The bees could check the validity of the story? They could buzz around and ask a few other people what they saw. If Lola ends up being the only source of the juicy story, in a Christian community, the bees would keep their mouths shut. If after careful checking, the story seems to be true, the bees need to decide what possible good can come from spreading the story. If the answer to that question is “no good at all, only pain and humiliation”, then again in a Christian community I would suggest the story should not be told.
Whether it is intentional or not, most rumours hurt someone. They cause humiliation. They cause pain. They destroy reputations and lives. For these reasons, telling rumours about someone is considered harassment at the very least and at its worst it constitutes serious bullying. Rumours that are spread via national telecommunications networks (phones & Internet) may also be criminal depending on what is said. Rumours and those who spread them are negative elements that our community could well do without. Good people do not start or spread rumours.
Catholic Schools accept their role in educating students in Christian values and socially responsible behaviour. We are here to support parents in educating their children in the right way to live in relationship with others. We must work together to ensure that our children are taught to think for themselves and not just believe whatever they hear. We must work together to ensure that our children are taught why it is wrong to start or spread rumours. We must work together to ensure that our children are taught the value of always seeking and speaking the truth. Let’s work together as a community to eradicate rumours from our school. Let’s stop telling rumours or malicious stories about people!
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