St Peter’s environmental initiative sees uniforms worn out for a good cause Year 6 Environmental Leaders at St Peter’s Primary school in Port Macquarie have begun a new environmental initiative in conjunction with ‘Worn Up,’  recycling non-wearable school uniforms. ‘Worn Up’ aims to reduce textiles in landfill by recycling unwanted and old school uniforms. ‘Worn Up’ can [...]

Passion drives Kitiara to thrive in an engineering career An ambassador for women in trades, Kitiara Porter, is graduating in the Cert III in Engineering (Metal Fabrication) after completing her four year apprenticeship with John Henry Institute. Kitiara is currently employed as a Boilermaker and has inspiring ambitions to one day work in mining. After realising her [...]

Mary’s Many Titles On September 15 each year the Catholic Church celebrates the memorial of Mary with the title ‘Our Lady of Sorrows’. There are over fifty titles given to Mary, though not all are acknowledged in the Liturgical Calendar of the Church. Why does Mary have so many different titles?  There are a number of reasons including: [...]

Update on the review of Parish Pastoral Council Per our Parish News (14-15 August 2021) Daniel Ang, the Director at the Sydney Centre for Evangelisation in the Archdiocese of Sydney, has been engaged by Fr Paul Gooley (PP) to undertake a review of our Parish Pastoral Council. The steps outlined in this process were publicised in the Parish News [...]

Our Lesley is Port’s Local Woman of the Year Congratulations to long time parishioner Lesley Tierney who has been honoured as the 2021 Local Woman of the Year for the Port Macquarie electorate. The NSW Local Women of the Year are chosen by Members of Parliament.  These local women are recognised for their outstanding contribution to their [...]

Language no barrier to learning for Ratchanee at John Henry Institute When Ratchanee Swinnerton first enquired about learning through John Henry Institute (JHI) she was concerned that her English reading and writing skills would not be good enough for the Certificate III Individual Support course. Ratchanee came from Thailand where she met her husband on holiday, moving [...]

Psalms come to life at Parish Retreat About 50 parishioners gathered at The Francis Retreat in Bonny Hills on Friday 21 May for the Parish Retreat, the theme of which was ‘Drawing comfort and strength from the Psalms’. Facilitator of the retreat was Rev Dr Elio Capra SDB, a Salesians of Don Bosco priest, who lectures in [...]

National Mass Celebrating 200 Years of Catholic Education St Agnes' Catholic Parish secondary school leaders and Principals joined with schools across the diocese to celebrate 200 Years of Catholic Education at a Mass held at St Carthage’s Cathedral in Lismore. This National Mass was held in cathedrals across Australia.  In the Bishop's absence, Fr Paul Gooley as [...]

Latest on Parish Flood Recovery efforts (as at 23 May 2021) St Agnes’ Catholic Parish Recovery Support Service Resilience NSW has entered into an Agreement with St Agnes’ Catholic Parish to establish and run for an initial 12-week period a recovery centre located next to our Pop Up Pantry in William Street. The centre will open from [...]

Mass enjoyed by all Last Wednesday, for the first time since 2019, the Parish was able to gather at an uplifting, joyful Mass to celebrate and thank its volunteers for their contribution. In his homily, Fr Paul drew on the words of Pope Francis, ‘You are among the most precious things the church has. You, who every [...]