WORSHIPPING TOGETHER
Worship and pray together is a regular experience for staff and students at Jubilee Primary School. There are regular prayer opportunities in the classroom as well as devotions and prayer at School Assemblies. Services of Worship take place throughout the year. Students are encouraged to explore ways they can contribute and lead worship.
There are four set times when there are special ecumenical services with the local pastors and community. Parents are most welcome to attend School Assemblies and Services of Worship.
Eucharistic / communion services also take place with due acknowledgement to the distinctive Christian practices of the differing Christian traditions.
Working ecumenically
Local clergy meet regularly with the School administration to discuss ecumenical issues as they relate to the School.
It is important also to conform with the correct editions and publications of any set texts as this avoids confusion with different books.
AN ECUMENICAL SCHOOL
The reality of the revelation of God in Jesus Christ is the central aspect of the ecumenical school. Christians believe that God has spoken and declared what is truthful about God and about themselves. Associated with this belief is the understanding that the gospel of Jesus Christ impels disunited Christians to strive to be united together in life and service in Christ.
Ecumenism involves a profound encounter where both what Christians have in common and what keeps them apart, is acknowledged in the relationship or the collaborative activity and dealt with in some way. The goal in this case is not just collaboration but furthering the restoration of unity between the divided Christian communities.
Too often, people confuse inter-denominational activity or non-denominational activity with genuine ecumenical activity. Indeed, it is sometimes thought to be "best practice" ecumenism when one avoids dealing with differences because doing so would disturb the harmonious collaboration or friendship between the Christian communities involved. In fact, such avoidance would ensure the exact opposite of a genuine ecumenical relationship.
Therefore, ecumenical is not the opposite of being Catholic or Anglican or Uniting or Apostolic but presupposes it. If a school were genuinely ecumenical, it would be Catholic and Anglican and Uniting Church and Apostolic at the same time. In other words, representatives of all of those Christian communities would be truly and fully and openly themselves as part of the ecumenical reality.
Jubilee is a fully ecumenical school. It has the commitment of four churches in different aspects of its life and structure. It is a genuinely collaborative effort where those involved have negotiated a way of establishing a school that respects their distinctive traditions and brings them into an open yet faithful encounter within the school. We hope that children attending Jubilee Primary School would leave here both more profoundly committed to their own tradition and, at the same time, more aware of, more open to, and more loving towards representatives of other Christian traditions.
(The substance of this section was taken from an address, Catholic Schools and Ecumenism by Bishop Michael Putney)
A Message from the Church Leaders
"Jubilee is a local church school that provides a high quality education. We support the school in its aims of servicing the local community with a school that is pastorally caring, educationally sound and committed to the fundamental Gospel values taught by Jesus Christ."
