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Charism
St Benedict’s Catholic School, Shaw is named after St Benedict of Nursia, who was born in 480 AD.
St Benedict is famous for his ‘Rule of Benedict’ that became the blueprint on which thousands of Monasteries were formed. Benedictine spirituality has offered our school a way of living in the world today by focusing on how to work, learn, pray and live in community. This spirituality does not require a departure from everyday life but rather a way that embraces and becomes fully engaged within our daily existence.
As a school community, a set of four values embedded in Benedictine spirituality have been designed to guide all our relationships, policies, learning and activities that take place at St Benedict’s. These values are:
- Love
- Community
- Learning
- Stewardship
In the spirit of St Benedict and Benedictine spirituality, each member of our community takes responsibility for seeing ‘God in all of life’ in our school. St Benedict’s will continue to make these values the principles of our foundation. This will ensure that St Benedict’s is a vibrant and welcoming place of learning.
Motto
'God in all of life'
What is Charism?
A charism is a divine spiritual gift given to an individual or group for the good of the community. Each religious order has a specific charism, a gift to be put to the service of the Church and the world.
Pope Paul VI was the first to label "charism" specifically in relation to religious institutes. He explained that the charism of the religious life is the fruit of the Holy Spirit, who is always at work within the Church.
A charism touches the very core of our existence and colours everything that we do as human beings. It allows us to see things in new ways, and to understand them even more wonderfully. We absorb a charism as we absorb sunshine, and we radiate a charism as a light pierces the darkness.
Patron Saint of Students
St Benedict is the Patron Saint of Students.
We have also used the teachings of St Benedict to underpin a ‘way of being’ which enables us to be the best members of our community that we can.
This way of being is a ‘Way of Peace’ – Peace being an acronym for Persistent, Empathetic, Accountable, Care for Community, Engaged. The word Peace was used as this stems from the Benedictine motto, “PAX”, which translated from latin simply means, PEACE.
St Benedict's Feast Day
The Feast Day of St Benedict’s is July 11. As this often falls during the holidays, we celebrate this Feast Day on a date at the beginning of Term 3.
Each year we will have a whole school Mass. This will be followed by activities about St Benedict and his teachings. The aim of these activities is for students to gain a greater insight into who St Benedict was and how they can live his messages in their life through contemplative practices, supporting those in need and adding to community projects.
Our Feast Day celebrations will conclude by showcasing and celebrating the variety of students' skills in ‘St Benny’s Got Talent’.
School logo
The logo of St Benedict’s Catholic School contains images, incorporating elements from both inside and outside of the Catholic tradition.
The book and the cross images highlight the most popularly reproduced symbols on the St Benedict’s medal. Images produced over the ages depict St Benedict holding a scroll or book in one hand and a staff which ended in a cross, representative of Christ, in the other.
The book symbolised Benedict's main achievement, his "Rule of Saint Benedict"(1), prepared for his monks. It has a unique spirit of balance, moderation and reasonableness which persuaded most religious communities founded throughout the Middle Ages to adopt it. As a result, his Rule became one of the most influential religious rules in western Christendom. (2)
The open book is also a powerful symbol depicting the Christian bible, and our learning environment.
The cross, is an important symbol for Christianity and is positioned in the centre of the logo to represent the centrality of Christ in who we are and in all that we do and is a key link to our motto – "God in all of Life”.
The sun is first mentioned in the bible along with the moon as the two great luminaries of heaven (Genesis 1:14-18). By their motions and influence they were intended to mark and divide times and seasons(3). External to our faith, the sun is a symbol of our north Queensland lifestyle, and introduces the concept of life, which is a powerful image for creative interpretation.
The image within the book has been created by Wulgurukaba-Bindal artist, Gavin Kum-Sing and represents a meeting place. The waves represent water and life, the circles are the campfires of the meeting place and the crescents surrounding the circles are groups of people to symbolise community.
The integrated images set the standard for how our students will learn; engaged in a variety of learning opportunities that bring true meaning to their understanding and to their overall school experience. The images provide a key connection between our faith, the creation story, our many communities of the school, Indigenous tradition and our beautiful location.