Sails in the sunset at Cable Beach, Broome, Western Australia.
Photo : G Ross.
Some sailed over the ocean in ships, earning their living on the seas.
They saw what the Lord can do,
His wonderful acts on the seas.
Ps 107 : 23 – 24.

Issue 5, September 2006, Highlights:

Editorial

Viewpoint

Farewell to the Pallotines

Creating a Vocations Culture 1

Creating a Vocations Culture 2

Creating a Vocations Culture 3

Remote communities of La Grange

KCP Magazine

Editorial

‘Life choices and choices for life’

Recent weeks have seen the departure of Fr Kevin McKelson from the Diocese of Broome after service lasting over fifty years. We have also celebrated the graduation from Notre Dame University Broome Campus of several local and interstate young men and women. In his occasional address at the Graduation, Fr Ray Hevern spoke eloquently of the dedication of the early Pallottine priests and brothers, but also of the local Aboriginal people who worked along side them to bring the gospel message to this part of remote Australia.

This month also saw the departure from the Diocesan Office of three women who have dedicated their professional lives to working in the areas of health and education and more recently in the Diocesan Office in Broome. Coincidently we celebrated also National Vocation Awareness Week at the beginning of the month. All of this speaks to us of the importance of dedication, long-term commitment and unselfish generosity on the part of so many people in our Church and wider community without whom the wheels of society, and indeed the Church, would grind to a disastrous halt.

These people are for the most part unsung and would probably not recognise themselves in any glowing tribute to their ministry. Such is the natural way in which they see this sort of service as part of who they are and not as a quality to be admired by others. It is a living out of the person they see themselves as called to be and to become. This is the living out of a vocation rather than a career. One musical composer put it like this – ‘Work is what you do for others; art is what you do for yourself’. This is not meant to be a selfseeking doing ‘for yourself’, but a living out of what is at the heart of who you are. You do it because to do otherwise is to deny who you are at your core.

In an age when we are told that people will change their jobs several times in their working life, it is easy to allow this to erode our appreciation for those who ‘stick at the task’, keep their hand on the plough, remain dedicated to their ‘vocation’ for a life time, even if they might change location for their work. It can easily become the expectation that dedication to a partner, to a way of life, to a profession or to a way of serving others is an out of date concept that belongs to a previous age.

Those mentioned at the beginning of this Editorial provide a timely reminder of the continuing value of a vocational approach to living one’s life. Maybe it is time for all of us to reassess where we are going as a society and as a Church, to ask whether one of the Australian values the current Government wants us to highlight and preserve is in fact one that Christians continue to treasure but may have lost sight of for a time– a sense of vocation.
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