Sydney Catholic schools’ student volunteers are continuing to make a difference to the lives of others during our city’s hard lockdown. To mark International Day of Charity (5 September) we are shining a spotlight on some of their charitable works.
Besides honoring Mother Teresa’s tireless work to help others overcome poverty and suffering, the International Day of Charity highlights the need to open wide your hand to your brothers and sisters, to the needy and to the poor.
Our student volunteers remind us that charity begins at home – lending a hand to your neighbors and friends – and that it can be both meaningful, magical and fun, and an energising escape from our day-to-day routine to give back to your community.
Preparation for One Meal
Our big-hearted students at St Joachim’s Catholic Primary School Lidcombe have been dedicating their time to spreading happiness by ‘Lighting up Lidcombe’ with creative messages of hope, support and humour, guaranteed to put a smile on your dial.
Students at St Ursula’s College Kingsgrove are realising their full potential through living out the school’s motto – ‘SERVIAM’, meaning ‘I Will Serve’.
Their school lies across the local government areas of Canterbury-Bankstown, Bayside and Georges River Council – areas of concern during COVID – and, along with students from Our Lady of Fatima Catholic Primary School Kingsgrove, they are spending hours of their own time cooking hot nutritious meals for people doing it tough within 5 kilometres of their schools.
They are doing this as part of a service titled One Meal Kingsgrove, supporting the not-for-profit organisation One Meal. The school also has a close relationship with the St Vincent de Paul Society.
“To see all three communities – St Ursula’s, Our Lady of Fatima and the parish – supporting this service has been one of the most humbling experiences of my teaching career,” One Meal Kingsgrove coordinator and teacher at St Ursula’s, Antoinette Nader, said.
Food at One Meal service
On Wednesday 2 September, 144 student volunteers completed their 58th straight week of service to the community through One Meal Kingsgrove, tirelessly providing over 120 meals for those in need, delivered in a COVID-safe way of course with kerbside collection.
“It has been a three year project getting this service up and running,” Ms Nader said with reference to One Meal Kingsgrove.
“We are a generous and giving community; one where the spirit of the Gospel and Angela Merici is alive and flourishing.”
