There is a particular weariness that settles in the bones when a person has lived too long around performance. Not the joyful kind of performance that draws a wide smile and fills the heart like children on a stage, a choir practising for a feast day, the brave delight of trying something new. I meanContinue reading “Stone Pillows and Straight Answers”
Author Archives: acollins16
The Arithmetic of a Vow
As I begin a new Pilates Challenge and Lent is looming I was reflecting on goal-setting. It can be so hard to stick to the goals we set. Most of us do not fail at goals because we are lazy. We fail because we are overexposed. Modern life has us living like houses with everyContinue reading “The Arithmetic of a Vow”
New Beginnings
The start of the year (especially a school year) begins with many aspirations, dreams and intentions. On the surface a new year is clean. It is the kind of beginning you can schedule: new diary, new term, new haircut, new uniform, new shoes that still squeak a little. But real beginnings are seldom neat. TheyContinue reading “New Beginnings”
The Shape of Blessing – A reflection on the Beatitudes in the Gospel of Matthew (5:1-12)
The Beatitudes can sound like soft words for a hard world. Blessed are the poor? The mourning? The meek? They’re not the ones we usually call successful. They’re not trending. They don’t win. And yet Jesus names them blessed. This blessing isn’t sentiment. It’s not about reward, or being good enough, or holding it allContinue reading “The Shape of Blessing – A reflection on the Beatitudes in the Gospel of Matthew (5:1-12)”
Praying With Pope Leo: A Quiet Act of Communion
There is something profoundly countercultural about prayer that is slow, deliberate, and shared. In a world that fractures attention and rewards immediacy, the Pray with the Pope initiative invites us into a different posture altogether: one of attentiveness, solidarity, and hope. Each month, Pope Leo shares a specific prayer intention. January calls us to prayContinue reading “Praying With Pope Leo: A Quiet Act of Communion”
A new year arrives
New Year’s Day arrives with its familiar confidence, as though time itself is a clean page and we are simply meant to write more neatly this time, but I have discovered, yet again, that grief does not respect the stationery of the calendar, and love does not pack itself away just because the date hasContinue reading “A new year arrives”
When the candles are interrupted
This year, Advent arrives with a bruise. In the midst of a season that teaches us to watch, to wait, and to practise the small disciplines of hope, Australia has become a nation of grief. A mass shooting at Bondi Beach struck people gathered for a Hanukkah celebration, killing 15 and injuring many others. Today,Continue reading “When the candles are interrupted”
Rites of Passage for young men
There comes a moment in every young man’s life when something shifts. His questions deepen, his choices begin to carry weight, and his world grows wider than his own reflection. Cultures recognised this moment and marked it – with blessing, with challenge, with community, with truth. Yet in the modern West, boys now cross theseContinue reading “Rites of Passage for young men”
Through the glass we see
There’s a quiet truth about the soul that we often forget in the noise of our days: what we take in becomes what we see. The images we scroll past, the stories we repeat, the voices that fill our feed: all of them polish or cloud the lens through which we look at the world.Continue reading “Through the glass we see”
The path and the shoes
A short reflection There are times in life when we stand at the edge of a path and feel ready to walk. We’ve studied the map, packed what we think we’ll need, and set out with purpose, perhaps even with a little Louboutin in our stride. At other times, the path appears beneath our feetContinue reading “The path and the shoes”
The Female Theologian 