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Gospel Values forTerm One:

Love, Forgivenessand Justice

71 0 t h M a y2 0 1 3

I S S U E

Birthday Wishes

Mitchell Suddaby 12th

May

Prayer of the Week

Prayer to Serve God Well

Father of Mercy,

forgive my failings,

keep me in Your Grace,

and lead me in the way of salvation.

Give me strength in serving Youas a follower of Christ.

May the Eucharist bring me Your

Forgiveness

and give me freedom to serve You all my

life.

May it help me to remain faithful

and give me the grace I need in Your service.

May it teach me the way to eternal life.

Quote of the Week

God writes the Gospel not in the

Bible alone, but also on trees, and

in the flowers and clouds and

stars.

- Martin Luther

This term we have welcomed back Mrs Stringer from maternity leave. She will be

with us for 3 days a fortnight. Its great to have you back in the team.

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Forgiveness

It has been fascinating watchingthe latest happenings in thecorridors of power with the

impulsive MP Mr Aaron

Gilmore, his unfortunate actions

in Hanmer springs and thesubsequent media feeding

frenzy that has pervaded the

airwave since. Also fascinatingis the way that these sorts of

incidents can galvanize or

polarise public opinion. My

initial thoughts over the incidentwere that he was simply a

pillock that had done something

silly (but not anything thatthreatened life or national

security) and he should simply

apologise to all concerned, learn

the lesson, and thatd probablybe the end of it. Unfortunately,

he chose to take a different

course and now he is receivingthe consequences for not being

completely honest or not takingownership of his actions.

What I find disturbing about thelatest developments is the way

that his own party, his

colleagues and his friends haveso very publicly turned on him

and are now lambasting him

through the media. The media,

sensing blood, are all over himlike a rash. His boss, our Prime

Minister, was initially doing the

correct thing and supporting hissomewhat errant junior

colleague.When The PM askedMr Gilmore for an explanation,

the one that hegave was not

School News

Subway Tuesday 14th

May.

School Uniform We

re now entering the

winter months so all

tudents should be in

he correct winter school

uniform, please also

make sure your child has

warm jacket.

Book Club Scholastic

Book Club is due back at

chool by 31st May.

Elections Nominations

lose Thursday 16th May

t 12noon. Please have

your nominations into

he school office before

hen along with a

andidates statement.

Miniball Miniball

tarts next week, Juniors

playing on Tuesday and

Seniors on Wednesday,

t would be great to see

ome parents along

upporting St Pats.

Mufti Day A gold coin

onation for students on

Monday wishing to wear

mufti. Students can also

et a hot chocolate at

morning tea time for a

urther donation. Funds

aised will go to Oxfam.

FASP Meeting to be

held on Monday, 7.30 at

5 Mary St.

PrincipalsCommentary:

entirely truthful and eventually

one of his fellow diners released

text evidence that showed thathe had knowingly lied to the

PM.

I do not agree with what MrGilmore did, and nor do I agree

with anyone using their position

of authority to assert influence

over someone else, or to bullyothers.

What really deeply concerns me

about this whole saga, which bythe way seems to be taking the

heat off the rather insidious bills

dropped into parliament this

week, is something that MrGilmore himself alluded to in

his press conference on

Wednesday: He said that thiswhole episode had been

harrowing, on him and on his

family. They had been thrust

into the limelight by a blood-thirsty media and the whole

family had suffered humiliation

and public vilification-throughassociation. The Prime Minister

very publicly suggested that Mr

Gilmore lacked integrity and

that he should leave parliament.The very same Prime Minister

that lied three times to the entire

Parliament over the GCSB saga

and his role in hiring theDirector of that organisation.

Double standards? You decide.

My concern is for Mr Gilmoreas a person, and for his family. I

agree that he shouldnt remain

in Parliament, (the PrimeMinister should probably step

down as well then), but I dont

think that we should publicly

humiliate him on the hour, everyhour. I dont believe that we

should put that sort of pressureon his family and I dont believethat we should cast away his

humanity because he got drunk

and made himself look stupid by

trying to bully a waiter, and Idont believe that we should

excommunicate him from

society because he thensuccumbed to the age old human

frailty of fear and probably

greed and lied to his boss to

keep his job.How much guilt would the

media or the Prime Minister feel

if Mr Gilmore became

driven to do something silly

over this, such as taking his own

life, or someone elses? He isunder immense pressure here.

How much responsibility would

they shoulder? No I am notbeing melodramatic. Yes, I

know that he stuffed up big

time. But he didnt kill or

assault anyone and no-one wasphysically harmed. I just dont

believe that we should cast away

a human being so glibly. Hemade a mistake. I suspect that

he is probably learning from that

right now. Where however, is

the humanity, the forgiveness,the Christian ethic and the love

for a fellow human being?

When I posed that question tosomeone today they said that we

should be able to expect better

behaviour than that from our

elected officials and that theyshould be squeaky clean. My

response was that he was neither

elected nor was he doinganything other than what his

boss did earlier by lying

repeatedly about the GCSB

saga. (leading by example?)So why am I concerningmyselfwith this topic in a school

newsletter?

Well, its about how we dealwith mistakes, and its about

that Christian value called

forgiveness.In my classroom I prefer to

encourage children to make

mistakes, as they learn fromthem possibly more than they do

from getting everything right all

the time. Making mistakes

generally happens when kids areextending themselves and trying

new learning. They certainlydont happen too often whenkids are playing it safe. I dont

criticise or humiliate my

students when they do make

mistakes. I try and talk throughthe mistakes and the steps so

that the students understand

where it was that they wentwrong. (Thats called learning

with a little dose of critical

thinking chucked in).

If my teachers make a mistake,(and believe it or not, it does

happen occasionally) we talk

about it, where we went wrong,

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Community Notices

Waimate Midgets

Rugby Its not too

late to register your

child. Come down on

Saturday at 12noon. For

kids 8 years and under.

Netball Opening day

will be on Saturday 11th

May for all players. St

Patricks students,

combined with other

rural schools students

have entered threeteams in the

competition. Look out

for the teams called

Northern.

Give Blood Tuesday

21st May between 1.30

to 6.30pm at the Knox

Church Hall, Manse

Street, Waimate.

Community Garden

are taking orders for

their pumpkin soup

fundraiser in mid July.

$3 per pottle or 4 for

$10, contact Kylie

Douglas 689 8950.

Elections

We are into the final week before nominations close for the Board of Trustees Elections. Get

your nomination forms in to the school office before 12noon on Thursday 16th May. It is also

suggested that you enclose a candidates statement with you nomination so voters get to

know who they are voting for on a personal level. We currently have 3 nominations StuartPrice, Anna Hart and Gareth Oudemans. If no other nominations come to hand then the three

nominations will be duly elected.

If more nominations are received and an election is needed then voting papers will be sent

out to everyone on the Electoral Roll on the 21st May and voting day will be on the 30th May

2013.

Votes will then be counted on the 5th June with candidates being notified by phone and otherpersonnel on the Electoral Roll can view the website for the results later in the day.

The new board will take office on the 6 th of June.

what we need to do to ensure it

oesnt happen again, what we

an learn from the mistake. Iont fire them, publicly dump on

hem or vilify them. I support and

uide them and I (hopefully)ncourage them to learn.

When I make a mistake, and I

now that its hard to believe that

could, but I do make the oddne, I talk to my employers and

we discuss it and do whatever we

an to make sure that the mistakes never repeated. They dont start

ublicly flagellating me with

ashes of humiliation and

arcasm. As good employers were obliged by law, if not by

morality, to support our

mployees and colleagues,articularly in time of need.

As Catholics and Christians, we

re obliged to help and support

ur brothers and sisters (fellowumans) in their hour of need, or

when we can least stomach it, for

hat is usually when the need isreatest. It is when the needy are

bhorrent, or immoral or

rotesque that we are challenged

o be forgiving, but it is when wehould be the most forgiving.

wonder what Jesus would say of

his situation? I wonder if He

would say something like Comen. Get real. He is a bully when

e drinks and he fearfully lied to

eep his job, but you guys reallyeed to lighten up.

Forgive him and pray for him, but

o not continue to harangue himecause his crimes are not as

einous as I suspect his

unishment is and the

unishment is being visited onmore than just him. Consider his

wife and his two school aged

children. And of course there

would be the let he who iswithout sin cast the first stone,

reminder.

If we treated our students (or eachother) like that, every time they

made a mistake and then denied it

or tried to hide it, our students

would all be nervous wrecks andat another school.

So also my heavenly Father will

do to every one of you, if you donot forgive your brother from

your heart."

Matthew 18:2335

Enrolments

We have several new entrant

enrolments starting this term andnext term. This is fantastic for the

long term future of the school. I

will be relying on all of our

students to make the new arrivalsfeel welcome and valued and to

ensure that they quickly become

part of our school family.We also have had interest from

several older students and they

are currently sorting out their

paperwork which they will thenneed to take to Father Brian for

preference enrolments.

One of the things that I notice

about education in Waimate isthat parents often exercise their

prerogative as to which schoolthey use, sometimes quite

regularly.I dont agree that children should

be shuffled around schools on awhim, or because mum and dad

have got their noses out of joint

over not getting their own way at

a school, or because they dont

like a teacher because they are

the wrong gender, personality,

colour or shape. But I do agreethat parents have the right to

change schools if they are not

happy with the education thattheir children are receiving.

It appears that there are

currently some movements

happening around the townwith some parents from other

schools making enquiries

about our school and someparents moving between the

other education providers in

and around the town.

We want our students to beleaders, not followers, and

following other students from

school to school, based onpopularity, not success, does

not work for me, as popularity

eventually fades and then the

roll eventually does too.I will not enrol students that

are not committed to our

Catholic special character andas we currently have no non-

preference vacancies, all

enrolments have to go through

Father Brian, and I do notbelieve he will either.

If you know of anyone

wanting to enrol at our school,

please direct them to call inand see me.

Just how I see it folks.Dont be offended.

Naku noa naMe rongo (In peace)

Darcy Kemp

Acting PrincipalSt Patricks School

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May the Year of Faithbe a time for allCatholics to renew their

esire and zeal for theEucharist and to availhemselves regularly ofhe Sacrament of

Reconciliation andPenance.

During this Year ofFaith, may all Catholicspublically proclaim theirove for Christ and hisChurch.May this Year of Faithemind us of ways toerve those in our midst

who are overlooked,gnored or rejected, sohat all may experiencehe peace and healing

of Christs love.

May the Holy Spiritguide the Church duringhe Year of Faith so thatall Catholics mayexperience a deepenedenewal of faith, hope

and love.

May young people be

nspired by this Year ofFaith to listen attentivelyand respond to Godscall to priesthood andeligious life.

Caf onCaf onQueenQueen

Caf and Wine Bar

Open 7 days

25 Queen StreetPh: (03) 689 6010

Breakfasts

Lunches

Evening Meals

Consult us for all your

St Patrick School would like to thank the following sponsors

Logo for the Year of Faith.

The boat in the logo represents the Church.

The main mast of the boat is a cross and its sails are the shape of the sun which

represents the Eucharist.

On the sails are the letters IHS, the first three letters of the Greek name for

Jesus.

Faith is the thing that we believe in and it is also the way bywhich we believe.