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Justice and Peace Group

About us

The Justice & Peace group at St Dominic's has been part of the parish for over twenty years. We work to reflect on the issues of the day and to assist our parish to play its part in responding to the call of the Gospel to work for a more just and peace-filled world. We meet on the last Monday of each month at 7.30pm for approximately an hour. The meetings are not overly formal and we discuss a range of current social issues.

We are always looking for new members and you would be more than welcome to join the group. Why not just come along, meet us and see if the work we do is something that would interest you - contact Fr Kevin at kevin.toomey@op.org.au

Social Justice Sunday 2024

In the 2024 – 2025 Social Justice Statement, “Truth and Peace: A Gospel Word in a Violent World”, Australia’s Bishops scrutinise the signs of our own troubled times, observe the violence around us, and ask why it is so. They also ask what is needed if there is to be peace.

In a world full of pessimism, they put their faith and hope in the possibility of peace.

Using scripture and the guidance of Pope St. John XXIII’s Pacem in Terris and Pope Francis’ Fratelli Tutti, we learn that peace is possible if we put our trust in Christ who is the way, the truth and the life and the Prince of Peace. It is from him that we learn about the architecture of peace. From him, we learn a commitment to the culture of encounter, the value of dialogue at all levels and the importance of seeing everyone as our sister, our brother.

A prayer for peace

Adapted from Pope Francis’ Fratelli Tutti

O God, Trinity of love,
from the profound communion

of your divine life,
pour out upon us a torrent of sisterly and brotherly love.
Grant us the love reflected

in the actions of Jesus,
in his family of Nazareth,
and in the early Christian community.

Grant that we Christians may live the Gospel,
discovering Christ in each human being,
recognizing him crucified
in the sufferings of the abandoned
and forgotten of our world,
and risen in each brother or sister
who makes a new start.

Come, Holy Spirit, show us your beauty,
reflected in all the peoples of the earth,
so that we may discover anew
that all are important and all are necessary,
different faces of the one humanity
that God so loves. Amen.

2023 Activities

During 2023 our Parish Social Justice Group continued to promote Social Justice in our parish community and beyond.

One of our areas of focus was in developing our own understanding of Justice & Peace issues, and sharing that with the parish. To that end:

We authored a number of feature items in our weekly parish Dominican, namely in relation to

Laudato Si’ week

NATSICC Sunday

Grandparents and Elderly

Social Justice Sunday - focus on Bishops’ statement

Season of Creation

Prisoner Sunday

Disability Sunday

And a parish blog item on modern slavery

We organised a forum at St Dominic’s on Sunday 15 October where Fr Bruce Duncan presented on the 60th anniversary of Pope John XXIII’s encyclical Pacem in Terris.

There were also some activities In service of the broader community:

A proportion of the Vodaphone rental received by the parish has for some years been allocated to address pressing human needs. We advised the Parish Priest on the distribution of these funds. We also oversaw the sale of Timor Leste coffee at the parish, and the distribution of the financial surplus to projects in Timor Leste.

The third annual Mental Health Liturgy with the Canterbury Council of Churches was held on Sunday 29 October, at St Dunstan’s, with Professor David Kissane AC as the main speaker. St Dominic’s J&P initiated this series and contributed to the organisation this year.

A working group initiated work on the development of a parish action plan in response to Pope Francis 2015 encyclical letter Laudato Si’ – Care for our Common Home.

Thanks to the St Dominic's team that collected food at Middle Camberwell Woolworths on Saturday, 6 May 2023. We were part of a Boroondara-wide effort that made a significant contribution to those in need in our neighbourhood, as together we collected around two thousand shopping bags of food for Camcare, Salvation Army, etc for people in Boroondara. The Hope for Boroondara food drive was also a great example of Christian witness in the community, and of cooperation across the Christian communities of Boroondara: it was organised by St Hilary's Anglican Church in Kew, and our own team include people from Deepdene Catholic parish and from the nearby East Camberwell Baptist Church.

Following the 2020 Social Justice Statement from the Australian Bishops on Mental Health and their earlier document on parish support for mental health, St Dominic’s parish has adopted mental health as one of our pastoral priorities. Click here to open our portal.

In 2021 the Bishops focused their Social Justice Statement on integral ecology, a major theme of Pope Francis (and of his namesake, St Francis of Assisi.
Our Integral Ecology portal contains resources, and updates on our efforts as a parish to follow a path of renewal and change, as we seek to respond to the Cry of the Earth and the Cry of the Poor.

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