Mary Mackillop

Mary MacKillop was born in Fitzroy, Melbourne on January the 15th 1842. She was the first child to Alexander MacKillop and Flora MacDonald. Mary was one child out of 8 and spent most of her childhood years looking after and acting like a second mother to her siblings. The MacKillop family were quite poor so at the young age of 14, Mary got herself a job as a governess and as teacher at a Portland school. All the money Mary earned

went towards her families everyday living. While working as a governess, Mary met Father Julian Tension Woods. By the time Mary had reached the age of 15 she had decided that she wanted to be a nun. She also wanted to devote her life to the poor and less fortunate. So upon meeting Father Julian Tension Woods she told him her hopes and dreams, and together they decided to set up a school. In 1861, they worked together and opened Australia's first free Catholic school. At the time only the rich could afford schooling. But at the school Mary opened anyone was welcome. Mary was a great teacher and became very popular within the community. Although Mary was very pleased with her work she still felt a religious calling. So Mary and Father Woods started their own order, 'The Sisters of St. Joseph.' In 1867 Mary then moved to Adelaide where she opened another school. Before long there were 17 schools open across Australia. Mary's followers grew and by 1909 she had followers all over Australia. Mary later died on the 8th of August 1909.

From quite a young age, when many people do not know what they are doing with their lives, Mary had already decided that she wanted to be a nun and help people as much as she could, she wanted to help the poor and less fortunate than her. Mary worked with people and children and expected nothing in return from anyone. When Mary first met Father Julian Tension Woods and they decided to set up a school, she believed that is was the path god had intended her to take and she recognized Father Woods as a messenger sent by god.

' Mary's heart was already with god and conventional values were not going to keep her away from the life he had chosen for her.' (Mary MacKillop A tribute, 1995)

Mary MacKillop was a true believer in god and wanted to follow him by doing good things for communities. She has a spiritual nature and an absolute faith in god. She was determined, compassionate, brave, honest, and had great courage.

" The holy work of god has to be attended to and if we are crushed and humbled to the very dust, as also laughing stocks to all who know us, we must be faithful and look for rest and peace only in heaven"

This quote was said by Mary and shows just how much she believes in god and looks up to god. She wanted to show people the great and wonderful things god can do for us. She wanted to become a nun to be a messenger from him and to send messages to those who needed help from god. Another quote said by her was:

" God is good to us. We should be grateful and prove our gratitude by our deeds"

This shows the way she feels about god and how she uses him/her in her life. She sees that god is part of her everyday life and if he is present with us in the day then he is present with us always and we have everything we need to survive. Mary believes God is good to us and therefore we should be grateful and prove how grateful we are by doing good deeds to those who need us. She applied the ideals that God had given to her in her everyday life by showing her appreciation by doing things for the poor. For example giving the poor children a good education. She also had another way of proving her gratefulness of God.

" Let us prove by increased confidence in god, by generosity in his service and by our mutual spirit of unity and love, that our delight and joy will be in trying to do God's will and it alone."

Fundamental questions in life are questions that not many people know the answer to. Many people spend their entire life just trying to answer one question. There is no right or wrong answer to these fundamental questions. Mary MacKillop answered many questions in her lifetime and her views on the topics are very interesting. One fundamental question in life is. " How do we know when we have found God". Mary MacKillop did not have an exact answer to this question but quotes she has said can explain the way that she felt about this question.

" If we have god, we have everything"

This is a really good way of seeing God. The point Mary MacKillop is trying to get across is that if we have God in our lives then we can find him anywhere. He is always with us and if we believe that he is always with us then we have everything in life that we need. If people can understand what she is saying and they relate to the quote then it is clear that the person has found god. People know they have found god in their lives when they believe they can find and relate to him. Another fundamental question in life is "what happens after death?" From research on Mary it is simply to see that she was not afraid of death. She did also not let it affect the things she loved doing. An example of the way she saw death was when she was dying. She enjoyed writing letters and even when she was at her dying stages she still continued to write letters, a little shakily but still legible. At this point in her life she was also suffering from Rheumatism and yet Mary MacKillop

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