Blessing and Opening at Penola planned for late October
October 20, 2012
' The Sisters of St Joseph will once again don the distinctive teal blue scarves they wore at the canonisation of St Mary of the Cross MacKillop in Rome two years ago when they attend the blessing and opening of Penola's new Josephite convent on Sunday, 28 October.
With the Feast day of Australia's first saint now celebrated on 8 August each year, the anniversary of Mary MacKillop's canonisation yesterday passed without any formal or special recognition. But all this will change in 10 days time when the Sisters and the entire town pull out all the stops for the blessing and opening not only of the new convent but of the Mary MacKillop Stable School Park next door which is being redeveloped as a pilgrimage centre and a sacred site of international importance.
The Most Rev Leonard Faulkner, Emeritus Archbishop of Adelaide will preside over the ceremony when he will bless and officially open the newly-completed convent and also bless the adjacent Mary MacKillop Stable School Park.
"Archbishop Leonard Faulkner has been a great supporter of the town and was instrumental in helping raise funds for the building of the Interpretive Mary MacKillop Centre in 1998," says Clare Larkin, volunteer staffer at the Centre. "He has a long association with us in Penola and been at all our special events, so we are delighted he will be here for the ceremony on Sunday, 28 October." '
